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UNITED STATUS OF AMERICA. 



THE CHILDREN'S BIBLE HOUR 




deborah. (See page 36.) 



THE 



CHILDREN'S BIBLE HOUR 



BY 



JENNY B. MERRILL 

AUTHOR OF " LITTLE FOLKS' BIBLE GALLERY," " BIBLE 
PICTURES AND STORIES," ETC., ETC. 



AND 



F. McCREADY .HARRIS (hope ledyard) 

AUTHOR OF " BIBLE SCENES AND STORIES," " THE GIRLS AT QUINNEMONT," " THE 

BOYS' REPUBLIC," ETC., ETC. 



ILLUSTRATED BY 

GUSTAVE DORE 



AND OTHERS 









FEB V 1888 



"'+y$0$/ 



THE PEOPLE'S PUBLISHING COMPANY, 

104 & 106 FOURTH AVENUE, NEW YORK, N. Y. 
40 DEARBORN ST., CHICAGO, ILLS. 



Copyright 

1888, 

By O. M. DUNHAM. 



All rights reserved. 









F-resi of W. L. Mershon & Co., 
R.hway, N . J. 



INTRODUCTION. 



Dear Boys and Girls : 

Several years have passed since I sent you a book of Bible Stories. 
I hear that some of you know the old stories very well and that you 
are ready for a new book. Here it is. But this time I have not 
written alone, as you will see by reading the title page. Perhaps you 
already know my friend, Mrs. Harris, for she has written many stories 
for boys and girls ; if not, it gives me pleasure to introduce you to her. 

You see that this book is a little larger, and you will find it a little 
more difficult than my last two books, because I remember that you 
have grown older. 

I think it probable that some of the stories will be entirely new to 
you. The Bible is so full of interesting stories that it takes a long 
time to learn them all. You know many Bible names. Let me see — 
Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, Samson, Hannah, 
Esther, David, Solomon, Daniel, and of course you know of Jesus and 
his disciples, of Paul and of Timothy. 

In this new book you will become better acquainted with some of 
these old friends, and you will also find names which may be altogether 
new to you, as Ezra, Jeremiah, Hezekiah, Michal, Deborah, Stephen. 

How many names there are in the Bible, and every name has a 



meaning 



I am sure you will want to get well acquainted with these new 
names. You like to make new friends, do you not ? The Bible tells 
us so much about some of these men and women that we can not write 
it all upon a single page, but we have found a way to help you learn 
the whole story. After you have read a story, look at the bottom of 



vi INTRODUCTION. 

the page and you will see where to find the story in the Bible. Some- 
times the same story is told two or three times over in different books of 
the Bible. You know the Bible is made up of sixty-six small books, all 
bound together. At first these books were not bound together but each 
one was kept by itself. Man}' of the separate books of the Bible are 
bound alone even now. You can get the book of Psalms, or the book of 
Proverbs, or the book of Matthew or John. I think you would like 
to read the Bible in these separate little parts. Perhaps it would not 
seem such a great task to read the Bible through, one little book at a 
time. Ask mamma to let you try it. But many of you are not old 
enough to read all of the Bible yet. There are parts that you could 
not understand, but I am quite sure you can all read the chapters that 
we have selected. We hope that you will not forget these Bible 
Readings. 

I need not ask you to look at the pictures ; of course you will do 
that willingly ; but will you study the pictures ? They will tell you 
many things that can not be written. 

A great artist, named Dore, made some of the pictures. He has 
made many more Bible pictures. I hope you will see them all some 
time. 

This is a very long letter. I must not keep you from the stories 
and pictures. Good-by, which means, " God be with you." 

Your loving friend, 

Jenny B. Merrill. 



THE CHILDREN'S BIBLE HOUR-PART I 




JACOB'S VISION. 

Have you ever had a very beautiful dream ? When I was a little 
girl, I often wished that I might dream of angels. Perhaps it was 
because I had read the story of Jacob's dream or vision. I will tell 
you the story. Jacob had left home to go on a long journey. He had 



i 2 JACOB'S VISION. 

to walk, for in those clays there were no cars or stages. Men 
traveled very often on camels, but this time Jacob walked, and 
he was all alone. When night came on, Jacob was still far out in the 
country away from any house. 

The Bible says, "And Jacob went out from Beer-Sheba, and 
went toward Haran. And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried 
there all night, because the sun was set ; and he took one of the stones 
of the place, and put it under his head, and'lay down in that place to 
sleep. 

And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and 
the top oi it reached to heaven ; and behold the angels of God 
ascending and descending on it. 

And behold, the Lord stood above it, and said, " I am the Lord, 
the God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac ; the land 
whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed ; and thy seed 
shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the 
west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south ; and in thee 
and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. 

" And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee whithersoever 
thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land ; for I will not 
leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of." 

And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, "Surely the 
Lord is in this place, and I knew it not." 

And he: was afraid and said, "I low dreadful is this place ! This 
is none other but the house of God, and this is the grate oi heaven." 

And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that 
he had put under his head, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil 
upon the top of it. And he called the name of that place Bethel, that 
the house of God. 

\\ as not this a beautiful and comforting dream lor Jacob to have 
when he was far away from home? 

Perhaps some day you may be far away from your home in a 
strange country. God will be near you, and He will send His 
angels to take charge of you, whether you see them in a vision 



MEETING OF JACOB AND ESAU. 



n 



or not. Perhaps you may feel " Nearer to God " than ever before, as 
Jacob did. 

There is a very sweet hymn, " Nearer my God to Thee," which 
speaks of Jacob and his wonderful dream; can you sing it ? Here is 
a part of it : 



" Though like a wanderer, 
The sun gone down, 
Darkness be over me, 
My rest a stone, 
Yet in my dreams I'd be, 
Nearer, my God, to thee, 
Nearer to thee. 



" There let the way appear, 
Steps unto heaven ; 
All that thou sendest me, 
In mercy given, 
Angels to beckon me, 
Nearer, my God, to thee, 
Nearer to thee." 



JACOB MEETING ESAU. 

Here are two brothers who once had a very bad quarrel. They 
were Abraham's grandsons. They had not seen each other for twenty 
years. Jacob, the one with his face hidden, was the most to blame. 
Esau, the other brother, had a right to his father's blessing as he was 
the oldest son. But Rebekah, their mother, helped Jacob to cheat his 
old, blind father, by covering himself with hairy skins. Then Isaac 
blessed Jacob, thinking he was Esau. Esau was very angry, and said 
he would kill Jacob. Then Rebekah sent Jacob away to her brother's 
in Haran. It was a long, lonely journey ; but one night God gave 
Jacob that beautiful dream of the ladder set upon the earth, and the 
top of it reaching to heaven. 

The next morning, as Jacob thought of God's promise, he said, 
"•The Lord shall be my God, and I will surely give one-tenth of all 
God gives me to the Lord." By and by Jacob reached his uncle 
Laban's, and God blessed him there. Jacob married and had eleven 
sons. Then the Lord said to Jacob, " Return to the land of thy 
fathers and to thy kindred, and I will be with thee." Yet, even with 
this promise, Jacob was afraid of Esau. Before he came to the land 
where Esau lived, he sent messengers with humble words to Esau. 
The men came back, saying, " We came to thy brother Esau, and he 



THE PLAGUE OF HAIL. 15 

is coming to meet thee with four hundred men. Jacob was sure Esau 
meant to fight, perhaps to kill him. Jacob prayed very earnestly to 
God for help. Then he sent men with' presents of cattle before him, 
and then he spent a night in prayer. 

The next morning he put his wives and children behind him, so 
that if there was any fighting, they could get away, and then he went 
to meet Esau. But Jacob need not have been afraid. Esau ran to 
meet Jacob and fell on his neck and kissed him. He had brought all 
his soldiers to honor his brother, not to fight him ! 

Bible Readings. — Gen. 25 : 27-34; 2 7 : I_ 45 \ 2 & > 2 9 : 1-20; 31 : 
3-17-18; 32; 7, 3 : 1-17- 



THE PLAGUE OF HAIL. 

Have you heard of the ten punishments or plagues that were sent 
to Pharaoh and his people ? Do you know why Pharaoh had to be 
punished so many times ? It was because he refused to let the 
Children of Israel go. They had lived in his country many years and 
had worked very hard for him. They were his slaves. 

At last God sent Moses to lead the Children of Israel back to 
their old home in Canaan. God sent Moses to Pharaoh with a 
message, saying, " Let my people go." But Pharaoh answered, "Who 
is the Lord that I should obey his voice to let Israel go ? I know not 
the Lord, neither will I let Israel go." 

Pharaoh did not want to lose so many slaves. He wanted more 
fine buildings and monuments built, like those you see in the picture. 
He had treated the Children of Israel very cruelly. He had sent men 
out with lashes to beat them, if they did not work faster and faster. 
Now God had sent Moses to deliver them, and Pharaoh could not 
keep them very much longer. 

God first punished Pharaoh by turning all the river and ponds of 
Egypt into blood for seven days. Then frogs were sent ; so many 
that they leaped into the houses, and got into the food and into the 



i6 



THE PLAGUE OF HAIL. 



beds. Then came the plagues of lice and of flies ; then their cattle died, 
after this many of the people had boils. In spite of all this 
punishment, Pharaoh still would not obey. Then came the plague of 
which we have a picture. It was "the plague of hail." "The Lord 
sent thunder and hail, and the fire ran along upon the ground, and the 
Lord rained hail upon 
the land of Egypt, and 
the hail smote every tree 
of the field." Do you 
know what hail is ? It 
is frozen ram. It is 
like small lumps of ice. 
Then Pharaoh sent 
for Moses and said, 
" I have sinned this 




tunc; the Lord is righteous, and I and my people are wicked. 
Entnat the Lord that there be no more mighty thunderings and 
hail, and I will let you go, and you shall stay no longer." But Pharoah 
did not keep his word, till a far greater punishment was sent. 
Bible Readings.— Ex. 7: 19-25; Chapters 8 to 12. 






LEAVING EGYPT. 



17 




DEPARTURE OF THE ISRAELITES. 



LEAVING EGYPT. 



This is a picture of the Israelites leaving Egypt. Would you like 
to know what made Pharaoh willing that they should leave? 

One day Moses told every Jewish family to kill a lamb. He told 



1 8 LEAVING EGYPT. 

each father to take some of the lamb's blood and stain the sides of the 
door of his house with the blood. Moses said, " The Lord will pass 
through to smite the Egyptians, and when Heseeth the blood He will 
pass over the door, and will not let the destroyer come into your 
houses to smite you." 

The people did as Moses commanded. I do not think the 
Israelites slept much that night. "And it came to pass that at 
midnight the Lord smote all the first-born in the land of Egypt. And 
there was a great cry in Egypt, for there was not" a house in which 
there was not one dead. 

Then Pharaoh called for Moses in the night and told him to take 
the Israelites away that minute. So they started in the night. Some 
of them had wet the flour for bread, without leaven, or yeast, in it, 
but they tied up the dough in their bundles, and when they halted 
they baked unleavened cakes. Think of the great crowd of people — 
six hundred thousand, besides children ! That night has never been 
forgotten by the Jews. God told them that when they reached the 
Promised Land, they were to keep a feast to remember this night. 
For seven days, every year, they were to eat unleavened bread. 

I suppose, as the people ate that unleavened bread in the early 
morning, after leaving Egypt, they thought, " Next year we will cat it 
in Canaan — what a feast we shall keep ! But they did not obey God, 
and for forty years they wandered in the wilderness. Only two, of all 
the men who left Egypt, lived to enter the Promised Land. It was 
good they did not know what was to happen. 

Look at the picture. Have they any horses ? How do the 
mothers carry their babies ? Which man is Moses? How did they 
know which way to go? The Lord went before them, by day in a 
pillar of cloud, and by night in a pillar of fire. 

Bible Readings. — Ex. Chapters 12-15 ; Heb. 11 : 23-29. 



THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. 



*9 




MOSES COMING DOWN FROM MOUNT SINAI. 



THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. 

And God spake all these words, saying, " I am the Lord thy God, 
which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage." 



so THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. 

(i). "Thou shalt have none other gods before me. 

(2). "Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor the 
likeness of any form that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth 
beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; thou shalt not bow 
down thyself unto them nor serve them; for I the Lord thy God am a 
jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, 
upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me ; 
and showing mercy unto a thousand generations of them that love me 
and keep my commandments. 

(3). "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain ; 
for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh His name in vain. 

(4). "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt 
thou labor and do all thy work; but the seventh day is a Sabbath unto 
the Lord thy God ; in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy 
son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy 
cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates ; for in six days the 
Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and 
rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, 
and hallowed it. 

(5). "Honor thy father and thy mother; that thy days may be 
long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. 

(6). "Thou shalt do no murder. 

(7). "Thou shalt not commit adultery. 

(8). "Thou shalt not steal. 

(9). "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor. 

(10). "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbors house, thou shalt not 
covet thy neighbor's wife, nor his man-servant, nor his maid-servant, 
nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbor's." 

Jesus put these ten commandments into two: 

" Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord." 

(1). "And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, 
and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. 

(2). " Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." 



A FATHER AND HIS CHILDREN. 



21 




A FATHER TEACHING THE LAW TO HIS CHILDREN. 



A FATHER AND HIS CHILDREN. 



How much there is to look at in this picture ! What do you 
think the man is talking about? The man is an Israelite, or. Jew. 
He is talking to his children about the word of God. A Ions* lone 
time aoT), Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible. God told the 



22 A FATHER AND HIS CHILDREN. 

Israelites to teach their children carefully out of the books Moses had 
written. God said, " These words which I command thee this day, 
shall he in thine heart, and thou shall teach them diligently unto thy 
children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and 
when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down and when 
thou nsest up." 

The Lord says this to all fathers and mothers. Do you like to 
hear about God's law? Do you like to learn His words ? His words 
are the only ones that are to last forever. 

As the years went on, more of the Bible was written; beautiful 
songs about war for the boys to learn. A song for shepherd boys, 
and chapters for girls. There is one chapter that every girl among 
the Israelites learned by heart. It is the thirty-first chapter of 
Proverbs, beginning at the tenth, verse. 

Do you see that box by the man's side? That has some of the 
Bible in it. God's Word was written at first on long sheets of parch- 
ment and rolled up. Moses told the Jews they were to bind the 
Word of God for a sign upon their heads, and let it be as frontlets 
between their eyes. After Moses died, some of the priests said he 
meant the people to wear a little box, with a Bible text in it, strapped 
on their foreheads and on their right arms. A great many wore these 
boxes. But David understood what Moses really meant. David 
saws, "Thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against 
thee." We hide words in our hearts when we learn them. Children 
can learn by heart more easily than older people. I heard an old lady 
of seventy recite a long chapter. She said, " I learned that chapter 
when I was ten years old, but I can't remember a word that I have 
learned since I was forty." 

So, while you arc young, learn the law of the Lord. It will be a 
Lamp to your feet and a Guide to your path. 

Bible Readings. — Dcut. 6: 1-12; Ps. 119: 9-16,33-35, 103-105; 
1 Tim. ; : 1 ;. 



SETTING UP THE TABERNACLE. 



23 




THE SETTING UP OF THE TABERNACLE. 



SETTING UP THE TABERNACLE. 



Do not you like to watch men building a house ? Did you ever 
think that the men have a pattern to go by ? One man makes the 



24 SETTING UP THE TABERNACLE. 

pattern, or plan, and another builds the house. Who do you think 
made the plan for the first house of God? The Lord Himself. It 
was not a house, but a tent that could be taken to pieces. 

When the Israelites were in the wilderness, God showed Moses 
the pattern of the Tabernacle. Moses was alone with God forty days 
in Mount Sinai, when he saw the pattern. 

The sides of the Tabernacle were made of boards and pillars, the 
ceiling" was of curtains. First an embroiderad linen one, over that one 
made of fine goat's hair, then one of rams' skins, and on top of all, one 
of thick leather. The boards and pillars were covered with gold. 
They fitted into each other. The Tabernacle had no door. Beautiful 
curtains hung in front. There were no windows ; there were two 
great candle-sticks or lamp-stands in the Tabernacle. Each candle- 
stick had six lamps. These lamps were kept burning day and night. 

bar inside the Tabernacle there was a very beautiful curtain, or 
vail. Only the High Priest could go behind that vail. The Ark 
was kept behind it. There was a small altar of incense in front of the 
vail, and a table of shew-bread. Twelve fresh loaves were put on this 
table every Sabbath. ■ 

A large court was marked off all around the Tabernacle, fenced 
in by brass pillars with curtains hanging between them. Do you see 
something that looks like a fountain ? That is the brazen lavcr, where 
the priests washed their hands and feet. How do you think they got 
the brass for it ? Every woman who had a looking-glass of polished 
brass, gave it to be melted forthelaver. Near the outside of the court 
stood the great brazen altar, where the priests offered sacrifice morning 
and evening. 

At last, in the second year, on the first day of the month, all was 
done. The Tabernacle was set up, and the court inclosed with 
curtains. Then a cloud covered the tent, and the glory 61 the Lord 
filled the Tabernacle. 

Bible Readings.— Ex. 35 : 4-35 ; 39 : 32-43 ; 40: 1-38. 



GRAPES OF ESI/COL. 



25 




BEARING BACK THE GRAPES OF ESHCOL. 

GRAPES OF ESHCOL. 

When the Israelites had left Egypt and were near Canaan, the 
Lord said to Moses, "Send thou men that they may search the land 



26 GRAPES OF ESHCOL. 

of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel!' Twelve of the 

chid men were chosen, and Moses said to them, "See the land what 
it is and the people that dwell therein; and be ye of good courage and 
bring of the fruit of the land." Now the time was the time of the first 
ripe grapes. 

The twelve men searched the land of Canaan for forty days, and 
then they came back, bringing a great branch with a cluster of grapes 
on it. See how big the grapes look ! 

The men told Moses and all the listening people, " We came to 
the land, and it is a rich, beautiful land ; this is the fruit of it. But the 
people are strong that dwell in the land, and the cities are walled and 
very great." 

But two of the twelve men, named Caleb and Joshua, talked very 
differently. Caleb said, "Let us go up at once and take the land, for 
we are well able to overcome it." 

But the other ten men said, "We are not able to go up against 
the people, for they are stronger than we. We saw giants in the land, 
and we seemed no bigger than grasshoppers by the side of the great 
tall men." 

Then all the Israelites cried out and begged to go back to Egypt. 
They said, °We will die by the sword and our wives and children will 
perish." But Joshua and Caleb said, "The land which we passed 
through is an exceeding good land. If the Lord delight in us, He 
will bring us into this land and give it us. The Lord is with us, have 
no fear of the people." 

But the Israelites wanted to stone Joshua and Caleb! Then 
the glory of the Lord appeared before all the children of Israel! And 
God told the Israelites that not one of the grown people should go into 
Canaan, except Caleb and Joshua. All the rest must die in the 
wilderness, but the children, after forty years, should go in and possess 
the land. 

Bible Readings. — Numbers, Chapters 13, 14. 



FLEEING TO THE CITY OF REFUGE. 



27 








FLEEING TO THE CITY OF REFUGE. 



FLEEING TO THE CITY OF REFUGE. 



Have you ever heard of the six cities of refuge? These cities 
were in the land of Canaan, which God <rave to the children of Israel 



2 8 FLEE IX G TO THE CITY OF REFUGE. 

after they had wandered so many years in the wilderness. A refuge 
is a place of safety, and a "city of refuge" was a city in which a man 
could run and be safe, if some one wanted to kill him. 

In the picture you see the gate of one of the six cities of refuge. 

Ancient cities were often surrounded by walls ; this city has a 
wall, and the gate is in the wall. 

The elders of the city have come out to meet this man who has 
been running many miles, perhaps, to save his life. You see one of 
the elders is raising his hand as if to stop the man who has the sword. 

He can not kill the man now with his sword, because he has 
reached "a city of refuge." 

You may wonder why he wished to kill him. 

The man who ran away, had killed a brother of the man with the 
sword. 

Perhaps, then, he deserves to die; but it is not right to kill him 
until the judges find out whether he did it in anger, or whether it was 
only an accident. 

It may be that this man went out into the woods with a neighbor 
to cut down a tree. The head of the axe may have slipped off and 
struck the neighbor, so that he died. 

If that is the way it happened, would it be right to put him to 
death ? Certainly not ; then the elders of this city of refuge will let 
him live in their city so that he will be safe. 

Now you can understand why the Lord told Moses to appoint six 
cities of refuge. It was in order that a man who had killed his 
neighbor accidentally might not be put to death, and that every man 
should have a fair trial. 

It was not intended to save a man from death if he had willingly 
killed any one, for God has said, "At the hand of even' man's brother 
will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man 
shall his blood be shed." "He that killeth any man shall surely be 
put to death." 

But you know that there is a great difference between hurting 
your little sister or brother accidentally, or doing it on purpose. 



FLEEING TO THE CITY OF REFUGE. 29 

Sometimes it is hard to tell whether a man kills another on purpose 
or by accident ; but it is always right to inquire very carefully. In our 
country, we have a jury of twelve men appointed to decide. They 
take a longtime to decide, so as not to make a mistake. 

They never take the man's life unless they are sure he did kill on 
purpose. 

A man should never be put to death in haste as this man with the 
sword wants to do it. 

These are the names of the six cities of refuse : 

They appointed Kedesh in Galilee in Mount Naphtali, and She- 
chem in Mount Ephraim, and Kirjath-arba, which is Hebron, in the 
mountain of Judah. 

And on the other side Jordan, by Jericho eastward, they assigned 
Bezer in the wilderness upon the plain, out of the tribe of Reuben, 
and Ramoth in Gilead out of the tribe of Gad, and Golan in Bashan 
out of the tribe of Manasseh. 

If you have a Bible with a map of the tribes, you can easily find 
them. 

The man always ran to the nearest city of refuge. You will see 
that they were nearly equally distant. 

Bible Readings. — Deut. 19: 1-13; Num. n\ 9-34; Josh. 20: 1-9. 
Ps. 46. 




30 THE YEAR OF JUBILEE. 

THE YEAR OF JUBILEE. 

The year of Jubilee was a very happy time for the children of 
Israel. \\ hen it began, the people blew trumpets as you see this man 
doing. The Lord gave the people the year of Jubilee just as He 
gives us all good years. 

God told Moses that after the children of Israel reached Canaan, 
every fiftieth year should be a year of Jubilee. I suppose you want 
to know why the children of Israel were so glad in this year. God 
told Moses that in the year of Jubilee, every one who was a slave, or 
who was in prison, should be set free. 

Every man was to be allowed to go to his own home ; ior if he 
had sold it, or it had been taken away for debt, it was to be returned. 
God said that the year of Jubilee should be a year of rest, even the 
land should be allowed to rest, as if it were a Sabbath for the land. 
What do you think God meant by letting the land rest? He meant 
that the farmers must not dig it, nor sow seed in it. They must not 
even cut their grape-vines. 

But often grains and fruit grow out of the ground without having 
been planted by a farmer. The farmers were not to gather even such 
food, but leave it for the poor, and for strangers. 

When the time came, the priests blew the trumpets first, and then 
up and down the hills, all over the land of Canaan, the people joined 
in making the joyful sounds. 

This all happened long before the first Christmas Day. Still, I 
think it was something like Christmas. \\ hen next Christmas comes, 
and you hear so many children blowing trumpets, you must think of 
the old Jubilee Year of the children of Israel. Then you must think 
of the good news of our Christmas trumpets and our Christmas bells. 
It is this: "Unto you is born this day in the City of David, a 
Saviour which is Christ the Lord." 

Jesus has made every year a Jubilee Year for us by coming to live 
on our earth. 

Bible Readings. — Lev. 25 : 1-55; Luke, 2: 8-20; Luke, 4: 16-21. 



32 JERICHO, THE WALLED CITY. 

JERICHO, THE WALLED CITY. 

I wonder if you have ever seen a city with a wall all around it. 
Some old cities have walls, but there are none in this country. The 
walls were built to keep out robbers, and wild animals, and other 
enemies. Many of them were made so thick that people could drive 
in their carriages on the top. 

Canaan, the land the Lord had promised to the Israelites had 
great walled cities in it, full of tall soldiers. Jericho, the city you see 
in the picture, was one of the great cities of Canaan ; yet the soldiers in 
Jericho were very much frightened when they saw the Israelites 
marching toward them. They had heard how the Israelites had 
crossed the Jordan, how the priests, with the ark on their shoulders 
(you can see them in the picture) had stepped into the river. As the 
priests' feet touched the river, the waters rolled back, and left a dry 
path. Then the priests marched to the middle ot the river, and stood 
there while the Israelites crossed over. The priests came last, and then 
the waters rolled back. 

The people of Jericho trembled as they thought of all this, but the 
Israelites did not rush at the walls, nor try to fight. They walked 
quietly once around the city. Those men with rams' horns marched 
in front. How many horns are there ? Next came the priests with the 
ark, and then, quite silently, marched all the fighting men. This was 
done once every day for six days. The people of Jericho began to feel 
less afraid. Perhaps they laughed at the Israelites. 

The seventh day the people of the city must have wondered still 
more. The Israelites walked around the walls seven times ! And 
the seventh time, when the priests blew with the trumpets, Joshua said 
unto the people, "Shout, for the Lord hath given you the city." Then 
the Israelites shouted, and the priests blew with the trumpets, and it 
came to pass that the wall fell down flat, so that the people went up 
into the city, and they took the city. 

Bible Readings.- Joshua i : i-S, 14-17 ; Joshua 3 : 1-1;; 4: 1-12; 
Joshua 4 : 20-24 ; 6 : 1-20; 



34 



THE CAPTURE OF A I. 



THE CAPTURE OF AI. 



Have you heard that all the silver and gold in Jericho was to be 
given to the Lord ? The Israelites were forbidden to keep any of it. 
After Jericho had been taken, there was another city, called Ai, to be 
taken. The men who went to see Ai, said to Joshua: "Do not send 
all the people. Two or three thousand men can take Ai." So three 
thousand Israelites went to take the city. But when the men of Ai 
chased them, the Israelites were frightened and ran away. Joshua 
knew then that the Lord was not helping the Israelites. So Joshua 
fell down on his face before the ark. He prayed all day, saying: "O 
God, why hast thou brought us over Jordan to destroy us?" and the 
Lord said to Joshua : "Get thee up. Israel can not stand before the 
heathen, because a great wrong has been done. I will show you who 
has done the wrong." 

The next day Joshua called the twelve tribes out and the Lord 
took the tribe of Judah. Then each family of the tribe was called and 
the Lord took the family of Zarhites. Then each man in that family 
was called, and the Lord took Achan. Then Joshua said to Achan : 
" My son, give glory to the Lord. Confess your sin. Tell me now 
what thou hast done." 

Achan said : "Indeed I have sinned against the Lord. When 
I saw a goodly garment, and silver and gold, I coveted them and took 
them. They are hid in the earth in the middle of my tent." Then 
Joshua took Achan to the valley of Achor ; and Achan was stoned to 
death. Achan was punished to teach us how wicked it is to take what 
belongs to God. Remember Achan's sin began by wishing for what 
did not belong to him. We must ask the Lord to keep our wishes 



right. 



After Achan was punished, the Lord fought on Israel's side. 
Then the Israelites went to the city of Ai. That is Joshua standing 
with the spear in his hand. Do you see the city oi Ai burning ? Do 
you see one end of the ark ? Read in the Bible about the battle. 

Bible Readings. — Joshua, Chapter 6 : [8-19; 7 ; 8: 1-29. 




THE CAPTURE OF A I. 



36 DEBORAH. 

DEBORAH. 

When the Israelites reached Canaan, the Lord told them to have 
nothing to do with the heathen. But, instead of obeying God, the 
Israelites married heathen wives, and they learned to worship idols. 
Then the Lord let enemies trouble the Israelites. They were greatly 
distressed. But the Lord raised up judges, wise men who helped the 
Israelites, just as General Grant and President Lincoln helped us. 
For four hundred and twenty years the Lord kept sending these wise 
men to judge and help the people. One judge was a woman, named 
Deborah. In her time the Lord gave Israel into the hand of Jabin, 
King of Canaan. The captain of Jabin's army was a great man, 
named Sisera. He had nine hundred chariots of iron, and for twenty 
years he oppressed the Israelites. 

Then Deborah sent for Barak, a Jewish soldier. She told Barak 
that God wished him to take ten thousand men to Mount Tabor. " I 
will draw Sisera unto thee," God promised, " with his chariots and 
people, and I will deliver him into thine hand." 

Barak said to Deborah, "If thou wilt go with me, I will go." "I 
will go with thee," said Deborah, "for the Lord will let a woman take 
Sisera." So they went up to .Mount Tabor, and Sisera came after 
them with all his chariots and hosts of men. The Lord fought for 
Israel, so they conquered. 

Sisera jumped out of his chariot and ran away. He went to the 
tent of a woman named Jael ; Jael's husband was Siscra's friend, so 
Sisera thought Jael would hide him. But Jael thought it was her duty 
to kill the enemy of Israel. So, after Sisera had gone to sleep in her 
tent, she took a nail of the tent and took a hammer in her hand, and 
smote it into his temple, and fastened it into the ground, for he was 
fast asleep and weary. So Sisera died. 

Many women'have helped their people in war times. But how 
much better it will be when there is no more war! Then all nations 
will love and help one another. 

Bible Readings. — Judges, Chapters 4 and 5; Is. 2: 1-5. 




SISERA MEETING JAEL AT THE TENT. 



58 sAJ/sav. 



SAMSON. 



About three hundred years after Joshua died, the Israelites were 
very wicked. So the Lord let some people called Philistines rule over 
them for forty years. An Israelite named Manoah, lived at that time. 
He and his wife loved the Lord. One day the angel of the Lord told 
them their little baby-boy should help the Israelites fight the Philistines. 
Manoah called his boy Samson. Samson grew up to be the strongest 
man in the world. 

The Philistines said the Israelites must gfive Samson to them. So 
three thousand Israelites went to Samson and said, " We must tie you 
up and give you to the Philistines." Samson let them tie him with two 
new strong cords and give him to the Philistines. But when the 
Philistines shouted against Samson, the Spirit of the Lord came upon 
Samson, and he broke the strong new cords like threads. Then he 
picked up the jaw-bone of an ass and killed a thousand men with it. 

Another time Samson was asleep in a city called Gaza. The 
Philistines knew it ; so they locked the great iron gates of Gaza. They 
meant to unlock the gates very early, and creep in and kill Samson. 
But in the middle of the night Samson picked up the gates and carried 
them off. Do you see how big one gate is ? 

But Samson forgot the Lord. So the Lord let a Philistine woman 
cut off Samson's hair, and then he was no stronger than any other man. 
The Philistines took Samson, put out his eyes and made him work in 
the prison. But Samson prayed, and, as his hair grew his strength 
came back. One day the Philistines made a great feast in honor of 
their idol. They sent for Samson, and made fun of him as the boy 
led him into the temple. They set Samson between two great pillars 
that held up the second story of the temple. The place was crowded, 
there were thousands of people there. Then Samson prayed. I wish you 
would learn his prayer. "Oh Lord, remember me, I pray thee, 
and strengthen me, I pray thee." Then Samson took hold of the two 
pillars and bent over and he pulled the great temple down. So he died. 

Bible Readings. — Judges, 13 : 2-14; 15:9-17; 16 : 1-31. 




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SAMSON BEARING AWAY Till-: GATES. 



4 o DAVID AND MICHAL. 

DAVID AND MICHAL. 

Who do you think that man is ? Is that the way you get out of 
a house ? That man was once a shepherd boy. He killed a great giant 
and became a captain in the king's army. Yes, that is David. His 
wife is helping him out of the window. Her name is Michal. Saul, 
the first king of Israel, was Michal's father. 

After David killed Goliath, Saul let David marry his daughter 
Michal. But Saul soon began to hate David. Saul knew the Lord 
was going to make another man king instead of him. He began to 
think the Lord would make David king. When he heard the people 
praising David, he was jealous and hated David more and more. 
David used to play on his harp for Saul. One day, as David was 
playing, Saul threw a spear at him to kill him. David jumped one 
side and escaped. Then Saul sent men to watch David's house. Saul 
meant to have David killed in the morning. 

Then Michal said to David : "If you do not save your life 
to-night, to-morrow you will be killed." So Michal let David down 
from the window and he went away. Then Michal took an image and 
covered it up, so it looked as if a man lay in the bed. \\ hen Saul sent 
for David, Michal said : " David is sick." Saul told the men to see 
David. Michal had to let the men into the bed-room, and they found 
only an image in the bed. Saul was angry that David was safe. How 
often Michal must have thought of that night when her husband 
escaped by the window ! Years after Michal lived a quiet, peaceful 
life in Jerusalem. 

Jonathan, David's great friend, was Michal's brother. David is 
called the sweet singer of Israel. Many of the Psalms were written 
by him. Read the twenty-third Psalm, and the thirty-seventh. That 
Psalm teaches us not to fret. David says : " Rest in the Lord and 
wait patiently for him." That is what David did. He could have 
killed Saul, but he waited patiently, and at last Saul died, and David 
was crowned king of Israel. 

Bible Readings. — I.Sam. 15: 11-28; 16: 1-13, 19-23; 1 7 and 18: 
1-16, 20-30 ; 19 : 20 ; 24 : 1-22 ; Psalms, 23, 37, 91. 




THE ESCAPE OF DAVID THROUGH THE WINDOW. 



42 ELIJAH'S PRAYER. 

ELIJAH'S PRAYER. 

It was much harder to believe in God before Jesus came and lived 
on the earth. So God did wonderful things to help the people believe 
on Him. This picture shows us one of the ways in which the Lord 
helped the Israelites to believe in the true God. 

The Israelites had a wicked king who worshiped an idol called 
Baal. King Ahab kept four hundred and fifty prophets to offer 
sacrifices to Baal. Almost all of the Israelites worshiped the idol, and 
a prophet named Elijah was the only man that stood up boldly for the 
true God. Elijah never forgot that he was all the time in God's sight. 

One time Elijah stood before King Ahab and said, " Let us see 
who is the true God. Let the prophets of Baal put a bullock on an 
altar, but put no fire near; I will put a bullock on an altar and put no 
fire near. Then let your priests pray to Baal, and I will call on the 
name of the Lord. The God that answers by fire, let him be God." 
And all the people answered, " It is well spoken." 

Elijah let the prophets of Baal try first. They put a bullock on 
an altar and then cried out to Baal from morning until noon. But 
there was no answer. Elijah could not help saying, " Cry aloud ; either 
he is walking or he is on a journey, or perhaps he is asleep and must 
be waked." 

Then, at the hour of evening prayer, Elijah took twelve stones 
and built an altar and put wood on it. He dug a ditch all around the 
altar, and laid the bullock on the wood. Then he told the people to 
pour four barrels of water on the bullock. They did this three times 
till the ditch was full of water. Then Elijah prayed, " Lord, let it be 
known this day that thou art God in Israel." 

Then the fire of the Lord fell and burnt up the bullock, and the 
wood and even licked up the water. Can you see the other altar ? 

Remember, "tins God is our God." He hears our prayers. Let 
us not forget that we are standing before I Inn, just as Elijah said. 

Bible Readings. — I Kings, Chapters 17 and [8 ; II Kings, 2: 
I-16. 




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ELIJAH ON CAKMlil.. 



44 



A LESSON FROM THE ANT. 




" GO TO THE ANT, THOU SLUGGARD ; CONSIDER HER WAYS, AND 13E WISE. PROV. VI. 0. 



A LESSON FROM THE ANT. 

Here is a man who does not want to work. He is not sick. See 
his strong arms and legs ! Why did he go to sleep when there was so 
much work to be done ? You can see by the picture that it is harvest- 
time ; the wheat is ripe and ought to be cut down. 

I will tell you why this man is sleeping instead of working. He is 
lazy. 



A LESSON FROM THE ANT. 45 

Do you know of any busy little creatures that might teach this 
man a lesson ? I think it would do him good to watch the little ants 
running hither and thither, gathering all the food they can find. 

Have you ever watched the little ant-hills by the road or in a 
garden ? 

Ants build wonderful houses under-ground. They store away 
food for the winter. 

The ant is a very brave little creature. I have seen it try to carry 
a load bister than itself. I am sure this man never had to work 
harder than that. Wise King Solomon wrote these words in the Bible 
to all who are like this lazy man. "Go to the ant, thou sluggard; 
consider her ways and be wise." 

If this man sleeps when he ought to work, he will soon become 
poor. 

" O, we may get weary, 
And think work is dreary; 
'Tis harder by far 
To have nothing to do." 

I hope you are not a lazy child. God is not pleased to have us 
waste our time. Time is so precious that some one has said, "God 
only gives it to us by seconds" 

I will tell you an old fable about " The Grasshopper and the Ant." 

A grasshopper that had sung all summer, grew very hungry when 
winter came. It had not stored away any food. - So the grasshopper 
went to the ant to beg for some wheat. 

"What did you do all summer ?" asked Mrs. Ant. 

" O, I sang to please the people," said Mrs. Grasshopper. 

"Very well," said Mrs. Ant. "Now you can dance." 

It was not a very kind answer, but I think it may teach us all a 
lesson. It is the same lesson Paul teaches us, "That if any would not 
work, neither should he eat." 

Bible Readings. — 11. Thes. 3: 10; Prov. 6:6-11; 10:4-5 ; 12: 
24; 13:4; 22: 29 ; 24: 30-34; 27: 23-27; Job 12: J-S; Rom. 12 : 11. 



46 HEZEKIAH CLEANSING THE TEMPLE. 

HEZEKIAH CLEANSING THE TEMPLE. 

Do you see a king in this picture? He is talking about that pole 
that his servants are earning out. What is twined around the pole? 

The king's name is Hezekiah. He was a very good king. The 
Bible says he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord. The 
very first year that Hezekiah was king, he had the temple cleansed. 
This was the beautiful temple which King Solomon had built. Wicked 
kings who worshiped idols, had let the temple be neglected. More 
than one hundred years before, a young king, named Joash, had 
repaired the temple, but even Joash worshiped idols when he grew old. 
Then for more than one hundred years the kings and people had 
neglected God's temple. They had even made an idol of something 
that Moses had made long, long before. Do you remember why it 
was that Moses made a serpent of brass ? The pole with the serpent 
twined around it had been kept for nearly seven hundred years. The 
people made an idol of it ; they burnt incense before it. So when 
Hezekiah had the temple cleansed, he made his servants drag out the 
brazen serpent and break it; he said, "It is only a piece ol brass." 

Then, when the temple was cleansed, Hezekiah called the people 
together to keep the Passover Feast. The king sent posts, or letters, 
from city to city, and asked all to come. Some of the people laughed 
at, and mocked the king's messengers, but many came to Jerusalem. 
Hezekiah prayed himself for the people, and the children of Israel 
kept the feast of unleavened bread seven days with great gladness. 
Then they were so happy that they kept the feast seven days longer. 
Hezekiah and the princes gave plenty of meat to the poor people. 

After this feast the people went home, and the first thing they did 
was to destroy all the groves and altars where the}' used to worship 
idols. Read about Hezckiah's sickness and how he was cured. I am 
sorry to say this good king had a very bad son named Manasseh. But 
Hezckiah's prayers were heard, for before Manasseh died, he repented. 

Bible Readings.- -I I Kings, iS: 1-16; II Chron., 30: 1-27; I 
Kings, 5, and 6: 37-38; Num., 21 : 4-10. 




HEZEKIAH CLEANSING THE TEMPLE. 



48 THE RECHABITES. 

THE RECHABITES. 

The man who is standing alone by the table in this picture, is a 
prophet named Jeremiah. 

He suffered very much ; again and again he was put into prison. 
The king of Judah wanted Jeremiah to say one thing, and God told 
Jeremiah to say quite another thing. Jeremiah obeyed God, and then 
the king put him in prison. 

But every one knew that Jeremiah was a prophet of the Lord, so 
the king after a time let him go free. As soon as Jeremiah was free, 
he tried to teach the people their duty. The people had disobeyed so 
often that God had said they should be sold as slaves, and go far away 
to a strange land. Jeremiah begged them to obey God; but no, they 
would not, so the great king of the Chaldeans came with his great 
army to make slaves of the Jews. 

Nebuchadnezzar, the king of the Chaldeans, thought he was 
fighting the Jews, and burning their homes and villages, just because 
he wanted to. 

But he could not have hurt the Jews unless God had let him. 
Jeremiah knew this, and he said to the people, " Though you had 
smitten the whole army of the Chaldeans, and there remained but 
wounded men among them, yet should they rise up every man in his 
tent and burn the city with fire." 

So you see it was not merely because the Chaldeans were so strong 
that they conquered. 

Do not think that God did not love His disobedient children. 
Your parents love you even when you disobey them. So God is 
always a loving Father, even when He punishes. 

The people in the small towns and villages thought they would 
be safe if they could get into the city of Jerusalem, which had a strong 
wall all around it, and was on a high hill. There were some strange 
people who lived in tents, called Rechabites ; they became frightened 
and came with their tents into the city. They pitched their tents in 
the streets and open places. I am sure the Jewish boys used to stand 



THE RECHABITES. 



49 



around the tents to watch them. One day Jeremiah came to the Re- 
chabites and asked some of them to come to a room with him. When 
they were in the room, he set wine before them and asked them to drink. 
But they said, " We will drink no wine." They told Jeremiah that long 
ago, they had promised Jonadab, the son of Rechab, their father, 
that they would never drink wine, or build houses, or have farms. 




OBEDIENCE OF THE RECHABITES. 



Jeremiah thought this would be a lesson of obedience to the Jews. 
He stood among the people outside the temple, and said, " Listen 
to the words from the Lord, T have sent unto you all my servants, 
the prophets, but you hearkened not unto me. These men have 
obeyed an earthly father; why will you not obey a Heavenly Father?' 

Bible Readings. — Jer., 35th Chapter. 



5Q 



JEREMIAH. 




JEREMIAH. 



JEREMIAH. 



Ha 



Have you ever seen this man before, whom they are pulling un 
out of the pit? ' '^t 

It is Jeremiah. Some of the Jewish princes were very angry 
with Jeremiah. The prophet had told the people to give up the city 



JEREMIAH. 51 

to the Chaldeans. The princes thought the people ought to fight the 
Chaldeans, so they asked the king to kill Jeremiah. 

The king would not kill the prophet, but he let the princes put 
Jeremiah into a pit. There was no water in the pit, but it was very 
muddy, and the poor man sank into the mire. 

The princes wanted to let Jeremiah starve to death in the pit, but 
Jeremiah was in God's hands in the pit as well as when he was free to 
walk alone. Perhaps he remembered how another of God's children 
was thrown into a pit. Do you know whom I mean ? 

A man who loved Jeremiah went and told the king how cruelly 
the princes had treated the prophet, and at last the king told Ebed- 
melech to take thirty men and drag Jeremiah out of the pit. In the 
picture the king seems to be watching them, as they pull Jeremiah up. 
See how angry that man in the corner looks ! Perhaps he is one of 
the wicked princes. Perhaps the man by the king is Ebed-melech. 

This king's name was Zedekiah. Jeremiah had told him again 
and again that he had better give himself and his city to the Chaldeans. 
The Lord meant the Chaldeans to conquer the Jews. But Zedekiah 
would not believe the prophet, and at last as the Chaldeans broke into 
the city at one gate, Zedekiah ran off through another gate. But the 
Chaldeans soon caught up with the king. They took him to Nebuch- 
adnezzar, and then they killed Zedekiah's two sons before him. 

Was not that sad enough ? But then they put out Zedekiah's 
eyes, and drove him in chains to Babylon. Jeremiah did not go to 
Babylon. The Chaldeans left a very few of the poorest Jews to live in 
Judea. 

The Chaldeans were very kind to Jeremiah ; they told him 'to do 
just as he liked, and he chose to stay with the poor people. He hoped 
they would at last listen to God's word. 

But they did not. They disobeyed God just as before. The 
Bible does not tell us any thing more about Jeremiah. Some say he 
died in peace, an old man; others say the Jews stoned him to death. 

Bible Readings. — Jer., Chapters 37 and 38; II Kings, 24: 17-20; 
25 : 1-17 ; II Chron., 36 : 1 1-21. 



5 2 DANIEL. 

DANIEL. 

Do you think you have' ever seen a picture of this man before? 
I am quite sure you have. Only in the other picture he was standing 
or sitting among lions. Yes, you know that this man is Daniel. 
Daniel was born in Jerusalem. His father w r as a rich prince. Perhaps 
he was one of those princes that did not believe Jeremiah's warning. 
But I am sure Daniel had a good mother, for he had learned to love 
and obey God when a boy. While Daniel was quite young, the king 
of Babylon came and took all the Jews to serve and work for him. 
King Nebuchadnezzar told his officers to choose only the brightest 
boys among the Jews, and bring them up to serve their new country. 
These boys were put in a school. Then they were given new names, to 
try to make them forget their own people and their native land. They 
had food and wine sent to them from the king's table. Daniel 
was one of the boys that was chosen, and three of his friends were in 
the school with him. Daniel "purposed in his heart" not to eat the 
rich food from the king's table, nor to drink the wine. He ate plain 
vegetable food and drank water. He grew fairer and healthier than 
those who ate from the king's table. I dare say some of the boys 
made fun of Daniel, but he "dared to do right." Daniel lived seventy 
years in Babylon. He became a great prince, and four different kings 
all honored him. It was not a king who wanted him thrown into the 
den of lions, but some jealous princes. But I want you to remember 
one thing about Daniel; he thought very little about Daniel, and he 
thought a great deal about God. The book in the Bible which this 
great man wrote is called the "Book of Daniel," but it tells very little 
of him ; it is full of thoughts of God and promises from God. You 
know if you hold your hand up in front of your eyes, you can shut out 
the great sun. So if your heart is full of thoughts about yourself you 
hide the Lord from you. Another thing you can learn from the story 
of Daniel is, that if we want to do great things for God, we ought to 
begin when we are young. 

Bible Readings. — Dan. i : 1-21 ; 6: 1-28. 




1) WIT" I. 



54 EZRA AND THE BOOK OF THE LAW. 

EZRA AND THE BOOK OF THE LAW. 

I know a Sunday School where they begin the school in a strange 
way. The teacher stands on a platform and slowly opens her Bible. 
As she opens the Bible, every child stands up. This picture tells you 
about the first man who opened his class that way. The man's name 
was Ezra. He lived about five hundred years before Christ. Ezra 
was a Jewish teacher and writer. Ezra was such a good man that 
even the heathen king respected and loved him. This king let Ezra 
take a great many of the Jews back to Jerusalem, and the king gave 
Ezra all the help he needed. Jerusalem was burnt and broken down, 
but Ezra and his Inends built it again. After the people were settled 
the}- wanted to hear the Word of God. Do you think each one had a 
Bible in his house ? Oh no ; there were only two or three copies of 
parts of the Old Testament. These copies were very precious, and 
only a few people knew how to read them. Ezra was the one who 
knew best how to read and explain the book. So the people asked 
him to have a £reat meeting- and read to them. And Ezra read from 
the book of the law of the Lord, from the morning until the mid-day. 
Ezra read out in the street. He stood upon a pulpit of wood, which 
they had made for the purpose. And Ezra opened the book in the 
sight of all the people (for he was above all the people), and when he 
opened it, all the people stood up, and Ezra blessed the Lord the great 
God; and all the people answered, Amen, Amen. And they bowed 
their heads and worshiped the Lord. So they read in the book in the 
law of God distinctly, and gave the sense, and caused them to under- 
stand the reading. Then he said unto them, "Go your way, eat the 
fat, and drink the sweet, and send portions unto them for whom 
nothing is prepared; for this day is holy unto our Lord; neither be ve 
sorry, for the joy of the Lord is your strength." 

Then the people kept a kind ol Thanksgiving feast. For seven 
days they all lived in little houses made ol branches ol trees, "every 
one on the roof of his house, and in their courts and in the courts of 
the house ol God, and in the streets." And there was very great 



EZRA AND THE BOOK OE THE LAW. 



55 



gladness. Also every day Ezra read in the book of the law of God. 
I think this must have been a kind of camp-meeting, do not you? 




EZRA READING THE LAW IN THE HEARING OF THE PEOPLE, 

Perhaps your teacher in Sunday School would like to hear of this way 
to open school. 

Bible Readings. — Ezra 7 : 1, 6-28; 8: 15-36; Neh. 8: 1-18. 



INCIENT ORIENTAL VINEYARD. 




ANCIl NT ORIENTAL VINEYARD. 



ANCIENT ORIENTAL VINEYARD. 

A vineyard is a place where grape-vines grow. 
I he grapes are now ripe and the men are gathering them to make 



wine. 



I he three men under the little shed are in the wine-press. The 
wine-press is lull ol grapes, and these nun are treading on them so as 
to press out the sweet juice This sweet juice will be very good to 
drink while it is fresh. But .soon it will begin to spoil. I will tell 



ANCIENT ORIENTAL VINEYARD. 57 

what will happen. The juice will begin to ''work," or terment as it is 
called. Little bubbles will rise to the surface. This shows the wine 
is spoiling and is no longer fit to drink. Have you ever heard what 
happens when wine ferments ? A very poisonous liquid called alcohol 
forms in the wine. No one puts the alcohol in ; the sugar decays and 
changes partly into this poison. 

You know nothing is fit to cat or drink after it has begun to decay. 

But strange to say, man}' people like the wine better after the 
alcohol is formed in it. They say it makes them feel bright and merry 
and helps them to forget their troubles. But "wine is a mocker;" that 
is, it deceives people, for the real truth is, that wine and every other 
drink that contains alcohol, bring sorrow, and sickness, and death,, 
instead of driving them away. Wise King Solomon wrote, "Who 
hath sorrow? They that tarry long at the wine" Then he gives us 
this wise counsel : 

" Look not upon the wine while it is red ; at last it biteth like a 
serpent." 

A wise mother told her son Lemuel, not to drink wine because it 
might make him "forget the law." That is just what wine does in our 
country, and the prisons are full of men and women who drank and 
then forgot to obey the law. A man who drinks, often forgets to work, 
so that soon his wife and little children have not enough clothes to wear, 
nor food to eat, nor fire to keep them warm. Some one who doesn't 
drink has to go and help them. 

A little boy who calls himself "a temperance boy," asked me in a 
letter, "Which is the worst liquor?" I told him brandy, whisk}', rum, 
and gin, because they have the most alcohol in them ; but every drink 
that has any alcohol in it is poisonous. We have no right to poison 
these wonderful body-houses that God has made for us to live in ! 

Set a watch at the door of your house (your lips) and let no alcohol 
pass it ! When you are a little older, I want you to read a very 
interesting book called "The Man Wonderful in the House 
Beautiful." 

Bible Readings. — Prov. 23 : 29-35 ; I Cor. 6 : 19-20. 



58 



TEACHING BY THE SEA-SIDE. 




JESUS Tl \( lll\<; BY THE SE V-SIDE. 



TEACHING BY THE SEA-SIDE. 

I have been looking at this picture- for a long time, ii will do 
you good to just sit and look, and think of Him who sits with lifted 
hand, talking to the people. Think! " Never man .-pake like this 
man." 



TEACHING BY THE SEA-SIDE. 59 

Think again ! Where did Jesus come from ? " In the beginning 
was the Word, and the Word was God, and the Word was made flesh, 
and dwelt among us." " He went about- doing good." He talked to 
the people in the streets, and by the sea-side. He told them stories. 
His stories meant' so much that great wise men could think, and think 
about them. Yet little children loved the stories and could understand 
them. This picture tells us about the time in Jesus' life when so many 
people came to listen to Him, that He had to sit in a boat while the 
people stood around the shore. He told them parables ; that means, 
He told them earthly stories that had heavenly meanings. He told 
them that beautiful day about a sower. Perhaps as Jesirs looked up 
to the hillside behind the crowd of people, He saw a man sowing- 
seed. So He told them of a man going out to sow seed, and how 
much of his seed went to waste. Some of it was picked up bv the 
birds before it had time to grow at all ; some seed seemed sown all 
right, for it came up, but the ground was stony and the little roots 
could not get down to the cool, moist earth ; so the seed died. Some 
seed fell among weeds and thorns ; though the seed did its best to 
grow, the thorns grew faster and faster, till the seed was choked. 

Perhaps as the children looked up in Jesus' face, they wondered 
that He seemed to care so much about the little seeds. PI is voice 
grew very sad, as He told about the choking thorns and the stony 
ground. But then, even the babies saw the beautiful smile that came, 
and the glad light in those loving eyes as Jesus said, " But others fell 
into good ground and brought forth fruit." 

Would you not like to sit close to Jesus and hear a story from 
Plis lips ? Let me tell you a way to hear Plim. Go alone by yourself 
and close your eyes. Think of Jesus and remember that Pie said, 
" Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world," and then 
take your Bible and read some of Jesus' stories. I think it will seem 
as if Jesus himself were teaching you. 

One of Jesus' names is, " The Word " — so that Pie does speak to 
you when you read " The Word," whether it seems so or not. 

Bible Readings.— Matt. 13 : 1-23 ; Mark 4 : 1-20 ; Luke 8 : 4-15. 



6o 



/ WILL, BE THOU CLEAN, 




I WILL, BE THOU CI .1 \\. 



"I WILL, BE THOU CLEAN." 

It was not only the: strong, well happy people that came to Jesus 
to hear His words, or receive His blessing. No, indeed; the lame, 
the blind, and the sick came ; some of them afraid to speak to Him, hut 
just touching the hem of I lis garment. Some of them were not able 
to walk, but were carried by their friends, and one poor man who could not 



/ WILL, BE THOU CLEAN. bi 

walk, and who had no friends — how do you think he reached Jesus? 
Why, Jesus came to him, and made him well and strong ! But there 
was one man who heard of Jesus, and longed to see Him. This man 
had a horrible skin disease ; he was a leper. The priest forbade a leper 
to go inside any town, or to come near any person. Every leper had 
to keep crying out, " Unclean, unclean," as he walked, and when the 
people heard that cry, they took great care to keep away from the poor 
leper. The lepers lived in caves in the hill-side, or in huts. No one 
could go near them even with food, but left it at a distance on the 
ground for the leper to get. It seldom happened that a leper got 
well. 

This leper had heard how hundreds of years before, a prophet of 
God had cured Naaman of leprosy. 

He heard Jesus called "The Prophet of Nazareth," and he 
thought, "Oh, if I could but speak to Him ! ' 

At last, one day just at evening-time, this poor leper saw crowds 
and crowds of people all going one way. Perhaps some kind woman 
told him, "We are going to the Prophet of Nazareth. He heals all 
who come to him." And later the leper met them coming back — the 
lame were leaping and praising God, the blind could see. 

" Jesus did it all," he heard ; "I will speak to him; Pie can make 
even a leper clean," thought the poor man. 

Very, very early the next morning, "a great while before day," 
Jesus waked and went alone to pray. His disciples came and told 
Him that all men were seeking Him. Then Jesus said they would 
walk along the road to the next town. And there on the road the leper 
came. He forgot to cry, " Unclean, unclean ;" he only thought of 
Jesus. He did not notice how the people shrank back, for Jesus came 
straight on ! And kneeling down almost fainting from hope and yet 
fear, the leper cried, " Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean ! ' 

See how the people start back as Jesus stoops and touches the 
leper! Then in loving tones, He says, " I will, be thou clean," and 
that instant the leper was well. 

Bible Readings. — Ex. 23 : 14-16; Lev. 23 : 39-44; John 7. 



62 /ESUS AND THE SABBATil. 

JESUS AND THE SABBATH. 

At that season, Jesus went 011 the Sabbath-day through the corn- 
fields ; and his disciples were an hungered, and began to pluck ears of 
corn, and to eat. 

But the Pharisees, when they saw it, said unto him, " Behold, thy 
disciples do that which it is not lawful to do upon the Sabbath. But 
he said, " Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungered, 
and they that were with him ; how r he entered into the house of God, 
and did eat the shewbread, which it was not lawful for him to eat ? 
Or have ye not read in the law, how that on the Sabbath-day the 
priests in the temple profane the Sabbath, and are guiltless ? But I 
say unto you, that One greater than the temple is here. 

" But if you had known what this meaneth, I desire mercy and not 
sacrifice, you would not have condemned the ouiltless. For the Son 
of Man is Lord of t lie Sabbath!' 

And he departed thence, and went into their synagogue : and 
behold, a man having a withered hand. And they asked him, "Is it 
lawful to heal on the Sabbath-day ? "And he said unto them, " What 
man shall there be of you, that shall have one sheep, and if this fall into 
a pit on the Sabbath-day, will he not lay hold on it, and lift it out ? ' 

Wherefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath-day. Then saith 
He to the man, " Stretch forth thy hand." And he stretched it forth ; 
and it was restored whole, as the other. But the Pharisees took counsel 
against him, how they might destrov him. And Jesus perceiving it, 
withdrew from thence ; and many followed him ; and he healed them 
all, and charged them that thev should not make him known : that it 
might be fulfilled, which was spoken by Isaiah, the prophet, saying — 

" Behold, my servant whom I have chosen : 
My beloved, in whom my soul is well-pleased : 
I will put my spirit upon him, 
And he shall declare judgment to the. Gentiles, 
And in His name shall the Gentiles trust." 

Bible Readings.- Math. 12 : 1-21 ; Luke 6: 1-12; Math. 7: 1-5; 
Mark 2 : 23-28 13: i- r > ; Levit. 24 : 5-9. 




JESUS AM) THE SABBATH. 



6 4 



THE ll'I DOW OF NAM. 




NG MAN I SAY UNTO THEE, 



THE WIDOW OF NAIN. 



What do you think these people are doing? Some look very glad, 
but some have their laces hidden as if they were crying. They are 
crying for joy. 

Jesus had been staying in a city called Capernaum. After heal- 



THE WIDOW OF NAIN. 65 

inor the servant of a rich man, He took the road that led to a little 
village called Nam. Jesus was not alone. What twelve men were 
with Him ? But besides His disciples, a great many people followed 
Him to hear Him talk. Perhaps they hoped He would do something 
wonderful. 

Now when Jesus came nigh to the gate of the city, behold, there 
was a dead man being carried out. He was the only son of his 
mother, and she was a widow, and much people of the city were with her. 
So these people met the people who were coming to the city with 
Jesus. The poor mother walked just in front of her dead son, and I 
think Jesus walked in front of the people who were with Him. The 
mother was weeping, for this was her only son. I don't think she saw 
Jesus. At any rate she did not expect any comfort from Him. But 
Jesus spoke to the poor mother. He said, "Weep not," and then He 
touched the bier or coffin, and they that bare it stood still. 

The crowd that were with Jesus felt sure He was going to help 
the poor mother. Jesus had not called any dead person back to the 
earth before, so no one knew He would raise the dead. But they 
knew He was able to do a great deal. They knew He loved to help 
any one who was in trouble. 

But the crowd who had come with the poor mother- — what do you 
think they thought? They wondered Jesus dared to touch the coffin, 
for they had been taught that a dead body was unclean. Perhaps some 
felt a little cross to be stopped in the hot sunshine. But in a moment 
they all learned what Jesus could do. He said, "Young man, I say 
unto thee arise." And he that was dead sat up and began to speak. 

Do you see the mother at Jesus' feet with her hands tight 
together ? She can hardly believe what she sees. But Jesus loosens 
the young man's hands and lays her boy's warm loving hand in the 
mother's trembling -one. 

I am sure that wielow loved Jesus. She thought nothing too 
much to do for him. 

Bible Readings. — Luke 7 : 1-1 7 ; Matt. 8 : 1-1 7 ; Luke 8:41 ; 42 : 
49-56. 



66 77//:' LUNATIC BREAKING HIS CHAINS 

THE LUNATIC BREAKING HIS CHAINS. 

Sec this poor wild man ! He was crazy ; we call him a lunatic ; 
he would not live in a house, but rushed out naked, and ran away to 
the mountains and lived in caves among the rocks. Then he screamed 
and cried and picked up sharp stones and cut himself. 

Some of his friends caught him and tried to bind him with strong 
chains, so that he could not run away. Look carefully and you will 
see that he broke even those strong" chains. One day Jesus came in a 
ship across the sea of Galilee, into the country where the lunatic lived. 

And when Jesus was come out of the ship the lunatic saw Him 
afar off and rail to Him and worshiped Him. Jesus knew at once what 
made the man so wild. It w r as an evil spirit, that is, a devil. Jesus 
said to the devil, "Come out of the man, thou unclean spirit." Now 
if you will read the story in the Bible, you will find out the name ol 
the devil, and where he went after he came out of the man. 

How I wish I could show 7 you another picture of this man after 
Jesus had sent the evil spirit away. You will have to shut your eyes 
and make a picture in your mind. Do you sec him ? Is he throwing 
his arms wildly about ? No indeed, he is sitting down quietly by 
Jesus' side. Is he naked ? No, he is clothed and in his right mind. 

Jesus talked kindly to him for a little while, and then He had to 
go back to the ship. \\ hat do you think the man wanted to do ? He 
wanted to go with Jesus into the ship. But Jesus said, "No, go home 
to vour friends and tell them how great things the Lord has done lor 
you, and how He had mercy on you." 

And the man went and told all his friends how great things Jesus 
had done for him, and all men did marvel. 

There are men now living, who act as wildly as this lunatic. 
Some of them are men who are crazy from strong drink. I wish that 
every man who has such an evil spirit in him would come to Jesus as 
tli'' lunatic did. For Jesus can cast out any evil spirit now, just as 
I le did when on earth. 

Bible Readings. -Mark 4: ^5-41 ; 5: 1-20; Luke S: 22-40. 




THE LUNATIC BREAKING HIS CHAINS. MARK V. 4. 



68 THE TRAXSFIGURATION. 

THE TRANSFIGURATION. 

One day Jesus took Peter, James and John up into a high 
mountain. Only four went up on the mountain, but how many do you 
see in the picture? Peter, James and John are kneeling down. 
Yes, you can easily tell which one is Jesus. The other two are Moses 
and Elias. Now Moses and Elias had been dead hundreds of years. 
Then where did they come from? 

They came from heaven to visit Jesus. They came to talk with 
Jesus about His death, which was very soon to take place. 

When Moses and Elias first came to see Jesus, Peter and James 
and John were heavy with sleep, but when they were full}' awake, they 
saw His glorv and the two men. that stood with Him. 

What a wonderful sight they saw as they opened their eyes ! 
Jesus was transfigured ; that is, His face was shining as the sun; even 
His clothing was white as the light, exceeding white as snow. \\ hen 
Moses and Elias turned to go away, Peter did not want them to go so 
soon. 

I like to read this beautiful story, because it makes me feel sure 
that when we go to heaven we will know our friends, and even other 
people whom we shall meet there, just as Peter knew Moses, although 
he had never seen him before. Our friends in heaven are not changed 
so that we will not know them, although their faces are brighter and 
they are dressed in shining garments. This story shows us that the 
angels do not always stay in one place ; they can make visits and talk 
with their friends. Some children think that the angels sing all the 
time. I am sure they always have songs in their hearts, but they do 
not sing all the time around a throne. This earth is very beautiful, 
but there are more beautiful things in heaven, and the angels love to 
go from place to place to sec and learn more and more about God's 
works. I think those angels who know more, teach the other angels, 
and certainly they all love and help each other in many ways. 

Bible Readings. — Matt. 17 : 1-9; Mark 9 : 2-10 ; Luke 9 : 28-36 ; 
. . 2 1 : 10-27 ; 22 : 1-5, 1 2-2 1 . 




THE TRANSFIGURATION. — MARK IX. 2-4. 



;o CHRIST AND THE TRIBUTE MONEY. 

CHRIST AND THE TRIBUTE MONEY. 

Have you ever seen a collection of coins in a museum ? Have 
you noticed the different pictures stamped upon them ? Many coins 
have the head of a king stamped on one side. 

The coin which Jesus is pointing to has the head of an old Roman 
emperor upon it. This emperor was called Caesar. Caesar had sent 
men to collect some money for him. 

Sometimes a king conquers a country in war ; then he makes the 
people of that country send him money too. Such money is called 
tribute money. The Jews had been conquered by the Romans and 
every year they had to send their tribute money to Caesar. 

One day these Pharisees came to ask Jesus a question about 
paying tribute money to Caesar. They said: "Is it right to give 
tribute to Caesar or not? Tell us, therefore, what thinkest thou?' 
The Pharisees were wicked men ; they did not really care to know 
what Jesus thought. They wanted to tempt Jesus to speak against 
Caesar, then they intended to tell Caesar and have Jesus arrested. 

But Jesus perceived their wickedness, and said, "Why tempt ye 
me, ye hypocrites?" Then Jesus said, "Show me a penny." And 
they brought a penny to Jesus. It was not a coin like our cent, but a 
Roman coin called a denary, worth about fifteen cents. 

When they had brought one, Jesus pointed to the coin as you see 
Him doing in the picture, and then asked a question. He said, 
"Whose image is on the penny?" They said Caesar's. 

Then Jesus said, "Give back to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, 
and unto God the things that are God's." 

When they heard Jesus answer, they were surprised, and left Him 
and went away. They supposed that Jesus would tell them to call no 
one king but God. 

Jesus showed them that they could honor an earthly king, and be 
true to God at the same time. 

Bible Readings. — Matt. 22 : 15-22 ; 17: 24-27 ; Mark 12 : 13-27 ; 
Luke 20 : 19-26. 




CHRIST AND THE TRIBUTE MONEY. 



72 ZACCHEUS. 

ZACCHEUS. 

Have you ever been to see a grand procession ? Wasn't it hard to get a 
place where you could see well ? I always envy the boys, for they can 
climb up into the trees, or to the top of the lamp-posts, and then they 
see right over the people's heads. Men are generally so tall they can 
see very well. Sometimes though, a man is very short. Then, if he 
wants to see in a crowd, he must get up on a post or in a tree. That 
is just what the man has done in this picture. His name is Zaccheus. 
He was a very rich man. He lived in a beautiful city called Jericho. 
Crowds and crow r ds of people were watching to see one man come to 
the city. Yes, that man was Jesus. Zaccheus wanted to see Jesus, 
but no one liked Zaccheus, and so no one helped him to a front place. 
Zaccheus had made his money by cheating the people, and so he had 
very few friends. He was a tax-collector for the Romans, a " publican," 
and he had taken too much money and kept some for himself. 

Yet Zaccheus wanted to see Jesus. Zaccheus wanted to be a 
better man, I think. And he ran before and climbed up into a syca- 
more tree to see Him. And when Jesus came to the place. He looked 
up and saw him, and said, "Zaccheus, come down, lor to-day I must 
abide at thy house." And Zaccheus made haste and received Jesus 
joyfully. 

But the Jews were angry and said Jesus had gone to stay with a 
sinner. 

When Zaccheus found his sins made the people speak against 
Jesus, he was ashamed, and very sorry. So he stood up before the 
people, and said, "Lord, I will give the half of my goods to the poor, 
and if I have taken anything from any man, I will give him back four 
times as much." 

Then Jesus told the people that He had come to the earth to help 
sinners. 1 Ic said, "The Son of Man is come to seek and to save that 
which was lost." Now you see why Jesus went home with Zaccheus. 
He went to save Zaccheus from those dreadful sins. 

Did you ever think that your naughty temper or your selfishness 



ZACCHEUS. 



73 



may make some one speak against Jesus ? People who do not love 
and serve Jesus, think less of Fhvi when His children act wrongly. 




ZACCHEUS CALLED BY CHRIST. 



Let us be like Zaccheus and give up our wrong-doing from love to the 
dear Saviour. 

Bible Readings. — Luke 19 : 1-10. 



74 THE GREAT DAY OF THE FEAST 

THE GREAT DAY OF THE FEAST. 

When Jesus was on earth, there was one great feast or holiday- 
time which must have been very interesting to children. It was the 
Feast of Tabernacles. This feast came in the early autumn, when the 
weather was neither hot nor cold. Every Jew, no matter how far away 
he lived, tried to come to Jerusalem for this feast. For a whole week, 
every one lived in tents made of green boughs. These booths, or tents, 
were put up on the flat roofs, and in the court-yards. 

The Jews lived in these tents to remind them of how their fathers 
lived in tents for forty years in the wilderness ; and during this Feast 
of Tabernacles, they offered thanks to God for the harvest, as we do 
at Thanksgiving. The feast lasted for seven days ; the last day was 
called the Great Day. At early dawn on that day, they rose up and 
dressed in their best, ready to take part in the services. Each boy 
and man had a willow and a myrtle branch, with a palm branch between, 
in his right hand; and in his left hand, a small kind of citron. There 
were three places to go to ; either straight to the Temple, or to a place 
near Jerusalem where they cut down willow branches, and brought 
them to trim the great altar ; or else they could join the procession to 
Siloam ; a priest walked in front of this procession, carrying a golden 
pitcher. At the pool of Siloam the priest stooped and filled the pitcher, 
and then they all marched back to the temple where the priest poured 
out the water at the great altar ; the people and other priests chanted 
from the psalms of David. Do you see the priest with the pitcher in 
his hand ? Last of all, as the people left the temple, they shook off the 
leaves of the willow branches and beat their palm branches to pieces. 
Then, in the afternoon, the booths were all taken down and the beast 
of Tabernacles was over. 

Just after the chanting of the psalms, there was a pause. It was 
then, when all was still, that Jesus, who had come to the lYmplc, stood 
and cried, " II any man thirst, let him conic unto Me and drink." 
Jesus was not thinking of water. He was thinking of our thirsting 
hearts. IK- knew our hearts grow thirsty lor love and happiness. 



THE GREAT DAY OE THE FEAST. 



75 



There is no longing of our hearts for goodness, love or happiness that 
Jesus can not satisfy. Indeed, Me invites us to come to Him if we 
are in need. Only the day before, Jesus had talked with the people, 
and some had believed, but some had only wondered. 

The priests had said, " Take him prisoner." But Jesus was not 




THE GREAT DAY OF THE FEAST. 



afraid of the priests. Many said, " This is the Christ." Others said, 
" Never man spake like this man." And no man ever did speak like 
Jesus. We know from His words, that He was our God. 
Bible Readings. — John 7 : 10-46. 



: 



JUJ 




JUDAS ISCARIOT COVENAN1 ING. 



JUDAS. 

How interested these people seem ! You can see they are talking 
about a secret. Who do you think that is in front? It is one of 



JUDAS. 77 

Jesus' disciples — Judas. He has been living with Jesus more than 
two years. 

Don't you think he must love' Jesus ? No, he did not love the 
Lord. I will tell you why. Judas loved himself too much to have 
any real love for Jesus. 

Judas saw Jesus heal the sick, and heard him say, "I am the 
Christ." Judas thought that Christ was to be a great king. So he 
stayed close to Jesus. He thought he loved Jesus, but he only loved 
what he hoped Jesus would give him. Judas kept the money to buy 
food for Jesus and his disciples. One day Judas was tempted to take 
some of that money for himself. If only he had told Jesus about it, 
our Saviour would have helped him. But Judas listened to the evil 
voice in his heart, and kept the money. That was very bad, was it 
not ? But that was not the worst. The chief priests and Pharisees 
hated Jesus. They wanted to kill Him, but before they could do that 
they had to take Him as a prisoner. 

" It won't do to arrest Jesus in the day-time," said the priests, 
" the people will be angry. Let us give some money to the man who 
will show us where to find Jesus at night." 

Judas heard about the money the priests would give. He began 
to wish for it. Judas knew it was wrong to tell the priests where 
Jesus was. But the evil spirit kept telling him how nice it would be 
to get the money. Judas had listened to the evil spirit before and 
therefore it was easier to do wrong now. When we do wrong once, it 
is easier to do it next time, and if we take the first wrong step, we 
can not tell where it may lead us. 

Judas went to the chief priests and said, "If you will give me 
thirty pieces of silver, I will take the soldiers to Jesus at night. 

Do you see the bag in the priest's hand ? That has the money in 
it. Read in the Bible how Judas brought the soldiers to Jesus. Read 
what he did with those thirty pieces of silver. 

Bible Readings.— Matt. 26: 3-5, 14-16; Matt. 27: 3-8; Mark 14: 
32-46; John 8: 1-4; John 12: 1-8. 



78 CHRIST MOCKED. 



CHRIST MOCKED. 



Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged Him. And the 
soldiers plaited a crown of thorns, and put it on His head, and arrayed 
Him in a purple garment. 

And Pilate went out again, and said unto them, " Behold, I 
bring Him out to you, that ye may know that I find no crime in Him." 

Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and a purple garment. 

And Pilate saith unto them, " Behold the man ! ' When there- 
fore, the chief priest and the officers saw him they cried out, saying, 
" Crucify him, crucify him." 

Pilate saith unto them, " Take Him yourselves and crucify Him ; 
for I find no crime in Him." 

Then the Jews answered him, "We have a law, and by that law 
He ought to die because He made Himself the Son of God." 

When Pilate therefore heard this saying, he was the more afraid ; 
and he entered into the palace again, and saith unto Jesus, " Whence 
art Thou ? ' But Jesus gave him no answer. 

Pilate therefore saith unto Him, " Speakest Thou not unto me ? 
knowest Thou not that I have power to release Thee, and have power to 
crucify Thee ? ' 

Jesus answered him, " Thou wouldest have no power against me, 
except it were given thee from above ; therefore he that delivered me 
unto thee hath greater sin. 

Upon this, Pilate sought to release Him; but the Jews cried out, 
saying, " If thou release -this man, thou art not Caesar's friend ; every 
one that maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar." 

When Pilate there heard these words, he brought Jesus out, and 
sat down on the judgment seat at a place called " The Pavement." 

And he saith unto the Jews, " Behold your king ! ' 

They therefore cried out, "Away with Him, away with Him, 
Crucify him." 

Bible Readings. — John 19 : 1-16 ; Math. 27 : 1 [-25 ; Mark 15 : 
1- 1 5 ; Puke 23 : 1 -24. 



J—J— MB 




•~E5f 



1 



CHRIS I MO< KID. 



80 CARRYING THE CROSS. 

CARRYING THE CROSS. 

They took Jesus therefore ; and He went out, bearing the cross for 
Himself unto the place which in Hebrew, is called Golgotha ; where 
they crucified Him, and with Him two others, on either side one, and 
Jesus in the midst. 

And Pilate wrote a title also, and put it on the cross, and the 
writing was, Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews. And it was 
written in Hebrew, and in Latin, and in Greek. 

The chief priests of the Jews therefore said to Pilate, " Write not 
the King of the Jews; but that he said, ' I am the King of the Jews." 

Pilate answered, 4l What I have written, I have written." 

The soldiers, therefore, when they had crucified Jesus, took His 
garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part ; and also the 
coat ; now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout. 

They said, therefore, one to another, " Let us not rend it, but cast 
lots for it, whose it shall be ; ' that the Scripture might be fulfilled, 
which saith, (Ps. 22 : 18.) 

" They parted My garments among them, 
And upon My vesture did they cast lots." 

These things, therefore the soldiers did. 

But there were standing by thecrossof Jesus, His mother, and His 
mother's sister, Mary the wile of Clopas, and Man- Magdalene. 

When Jesus therefore saw PI is mother, and the disciples standing 
by, whom lie loved, He saith unto His mother, " \\ oman, behold thy 
Son ! ' Then saith he to the disciple, " Behold thy mother ! ' And 
from that hour the disciple (John) took her unto his own home. 

After this, Jesus knowing that all things are now finished, that 
the Scripture might be accomplished, saith, " I thirst." 

1 here was set then a vessel full of vinegar ; so they put a sponge 
full of the vinegar upon hyssop, and brought it to his mouth; \\ hen 
Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, " It is finished ; '' 
and He bowed llis head and gave up His spirit. 

Bible Reading. John [9: 17-30; Luke. 23: 26-46; Mark 15; 
21-37 ; Math. 27 : 32-50. 




CARRYING THE v ROSS. 



$2 AFTER THE RESURRECTION. 



AFTER THE RESURRECTION. 

Suppose a little heathen boy, who had been told about Jesus 
dying on the cross, should see this picture. He would say, "Why, 
Jesus did not die, after all ! ' 

" Oh yes," you tell him, "Jesus died and was buried." 

" But," says the boy, " I am sure that is a picture of Jesus, and 
he has been nailed to the cross, for I see the marks of the nails in his 
hands. But he is not dead ! He is well and strong ! ' 

Then we would tell the boy of the resurrection — how the angel 
came and rolled away the stone from the sepulchre, and the Lord 
came forth — how He has promised us, " That, as in Adam all die, 
even so in Christ, shall all be made alive." 

This picture tells us about the Sunday night after that sad Friday, 
when Jesus was nailed to the cross. Ten of the disciples and some 
other friends were together in an upper room. Mary Magdalene told 
them she had seen the Lord early that morning. Two of the disciples 
had just come back from a village named Emmaus, to tell the others 
that the Lord had walked with them and had asked a blessing at 
their supper, and then had vanished. 

Jesus' friends wondered at all this, but as they wondered, Jesus 
stood in their midst, and said, " Peace be unto you." Some of them 
were frightened, but Jesus said, "Why are ye troubled ? Look at my 
hands and my feet, that it is I, myself." Then, to help them feel quite 
sure He was really alive, Jesus asked for some food, and ate a piece of 
fish before he left. 

But one disciple named Thomas was not there. \\ hen the others 
told him they had seen the Lord, he said, " Lnhss I shall see in His 
hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the 
nails, I will not believe." The next Sunday evening the disciples were 
in the same room again, and Thomas was with them. Then came 
Jesus and stood in the midst and said, " Peace be unto you." He told 



AFTER THE RESURRECTION. 



83 



Thomas to put his hand in the print of the nails. But Thomas knew 
Jesus, and said, " My Lord and my God." Jesus said, " Thomas, 




AFTER THE RESURRECTION. 



because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed ; blessed are they that 
have not seen and yet have believed." 

Bible Readings. — John 20th Chapter ; Luke 23 : 50-56; Luke 24. 



84 FEED MY LAMBS. 



FEED MY LAMBS. 

Can you tell me the name of any one in this picture ? Yes, the 
one with the mark in His hand is Jesus. Peter is standing- nearest 
Him. I think that is John next to Peter. We know that James and 
Nathanael are there, and two others. The seven disciples have been 
out in a boat fishing. They fished all night, but caught nothing. But 
when the morning was come, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples 
knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus told the disciples to cast the net on 
the right side of the ship and they would find. They obeyed, and now 
the net was full of fishes. 

Then John said to Peter, " It is the Lord." Peter jumped right 
into the water and swam to land. The other disciples came in a little 
boat, dragging the net. 

When they were all on shore, Jesus gave them a warm breakfast. 
Afterward Jesus said to Peter, " Lovest thou me?" 

Peter was sure he loved Jesus, and he said, " Yes, Lord, Thou 
knowest that I love Thee." Then Jesus said to Peter, " Peed my 
lambs." 

But Jesus asked Peter the same question three times. Do you 
remember what Peter had done three times ? Jesus knew Peter was 
very sorry that he had ever told such a lie, and had said he did 
not know Jesus. That is why Jesus let Peter tell his love three 
times. 

I am sure you know who Jesus meant by His lambs. Now, do 
you think Peter can {ccd you ? Yes, he has left some food tor you. 
You will find, in the Bible, a letter written by Peter, and it is lull ol 
food for your soul. Peter tells you in that letter that the Bible is milk 
for you. lie tells you that when you have tried to do right and yet 
some: one finds fault, to take it patiently, for this will please God. For 
it is better, il it is the will of God, that ye suffer for well-doing than for 
evil-doing. This may help you some time when people think you have 



FEED MY LAMBS. 



35 



done wrong and you are sure you have not. Peter tells you to be 
loving and pitiful and polite. Now if you will think of these things 




FEED MY LAMBS. 



and try to do them, your souls will be fed, and so Peter, by his letter, 
is still feeding Christ's lambs. 

BibleReadings. — John 21; Luke 22: 31-34; 54-61 ; I Peter 2: 
1-3; 20-25; I Peter 3: 8-14. 



86 "I GO TO PREPARE A PLACE FOR YOU." 

"I GO TO PREPARE A PLACE FOR YOU." 

"And Jesus led PI is disciples out as far as Bethany; and he lifted 
up His hands and blessed them." 

And it came to pass while He blessed them, Pie was parted from 
them and carried up into heaven. "And a cloud received Him out 
of their sight." 

"And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went 
up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; which also said,; 
'Ye men of Galilee, why stand you gazing up into heaven ? this same 
Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like 
manner as you have seen Him go into heaven.' 

"And the disciples worshiped Jesus, and returned to Jerusalem 
with great joy ; and were continually in the temple praising and blessing 
God." 

Do you wonder how the disciples could return to Jerusalem with 
great joy after Jesus had left them and ascended to heaven ? 

I think it must have been because Jesus had said to them, " In 
my Father's house are many mansions, if it were not so, I would have 
told you ; I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare 
a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself, that 
where I am, there ye may be also." 

Do you remember when it was that Jesus told His disciples about 
"the many mansions" in His Father's house? It was just after the 
Last Supper, the same night that He was betrayed. 

The disciples were very sad that night ; they could not understand 
why Jesus was to die, and then go away ; they did not want him to go 
away. But Jesus spoke kindly for He knew their hearts were troubled. 
1 [e said, " Let not your hearts be troubled. ... I will not leave you 
comfortless. / will come to you!' When you read the next story, 
you will see how Jesus remembered His promise to come and comfort 
His disciples. 

Bible Readings. — Luke 24: 50-53 ; Acts 1 : 9-14; John 14: 1-9, 

18-23. 




THE ASCENSION. 



8S THE COMING OF THE SPIRIT 

THE COMING OF THE SPIRIT. 

Do you remember that God spoke to Moses from a burning bush ? 
Do )'ou remember that He sent fire from heaven to burn the sacrifice 
when Elijah prayed ? This is another wonderful story about fire. 

In the picture you see little tongue-shaped flames. They will not 
burn ; they only appear bright like fire. One rests over each person. 
These men and women are Jesus' disciples and friends, who have been 
waiting and watching in Jerusalem for fifty days since Jesus ascended. 
Why did they wait and watch ? Jesus had told them to tarry in 
Jerusalem until power had come to them from on high. 

And when the day of Pentecost was come, they were all in one 
place. The day of Pentecost was a great feast-day, and many strangers 
had come to Jerusalem from different countries to celebrate the feast. 

But the disciples were gathered together in an upper room, as 
usual. "And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing 
mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And 
there appeared tongues, like as of fire, and sat upon each of them. And 
they were all filled with the Holy Spirit." 

Jesus had said just before He had ascended, " Lo, I am with you 
alway." He had said, "I will not leave you comfortless, I will come 
to you." But it was very hard for the disciples to understand that 
Jesus was with them after they had seen Him ascend into heaven. 
The Spirit of the Lord came in this wonderful way to help them 
understand that Jesus had not really left them. It was as if Jesus had 
come back, but not to live any more as a Man among them, but to live 
closer to them by His Spirit. "Lo, I am with you always." Godisa 
Spirit. We can not see a Spirit. "No man hath seen God at any time. 
but in many wonderful ways God has taught us of Himself. He 
was made flesh and dwelt among u.s. 1 1 e came in tins rushing mighty 
wind. Now we can understand that He is always with us, even though 
we can not see Him. 

Bible Readings. — Acts 2: 1-12; Matt. 28: 20; John 14: 15-21, 
25, 26 ; Mark 12 : 19 ; Deut. 6 : 4. 




THE DESCEN I OF I HI'. Sl'IKlT. 



9 o THE DEATH OF STEPHEN. 



THE DEATH OF STEPHEN. 

I do not wonder that some of these people are turning away, and 
covering their faces with their hands. I only wonder that any one can 
look at such a sight ! 

This man is being stoned to death. His name is Stephen. 

Still I think I would rather look at Stephen than at any other 
part of the picture. He looks so quiet and peaceful. He is not 
thinking of those dreadful stones, for he is looking right into heaven. 

Have you ever read in the Bible what Stephen said when he 
looked up into heaven and saw the glory of God ? 

He said, "Behold I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man 
standing on the right hand of God." These poor people did not 
understand that the Lord can open our inner eyes and let us see into 
heaven. They did not believe Stephen and would not listen. 

They cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears, so that 
they should not hear him tell what he saw in heaven. 

Some of the men rushed upon Stephen and cast him out of the 
city and stoned him. 

Stephen spoke to the Lord as he was dying, and said, " Lord 
Jesus, receive my spirit." Then Stephen kneeled down and prayed 
for his enemies just as Jesus prayed for the men who nailed him to the 
cross. Jesus said, "Lather, forgive them." Stephen said, "Lord, 
lay not this sin to their charge." 

In another moment Stephen was gone where the stones could not 
hurt him any more. He fell asleep and the Lord did receive him into 
heaven as he had asked. Stephen is there now, and we shall see him 
some day with many other martyrs who have suffered lor Jesus. For 
lt was because Stephen had preached about Jesus that he was stoned 
to death. 

Stephen is called the First Christian Martyr. 

Bible Readings. — Acts 6 : 1-15 ; 7: 1-60 ; S : 1-2; Matt. 5: 10-12, 
43-45 ; 6: 12 ; Luke 23 :. 34 ; Romans 12 : 14, 17-20. 




THE DEATH OF STEPHEN. 



9 2 THE JAILER. 



THE JAILER. 

You have heard how Saul, the Jew, who hated Christians, became 
Paul, the Christian, who preached Christ to the Jews, have you not? 
If not, ask mamma to read all about it. This picture tells you about 
something that happened to Paul and his friend Silas. Paul and Silas 
had come to a city called Philippi. 

A woman named Lydia lived in Philippi. When she heard Paul 
preach, she believed the gospel and was baptized. 

Then she begged Paul and Silas to stay at her house. So they 
staid there. Every day as they walked through the streets, a poor 
half-crazy girl followed them. 

She pointed to Paul and Silas, and said, "These men are the 
servants of the most high God." 

Some bad man used to pretend this poor girl could tell fortunes. 
The girl was their slave. But when she had followed Paul many days, 
Paul was sorry for her. He knew there was a wicked spirit in her. 
So he told the wicked spirit to leave the poor girl. Then she was just 
a quiet Christian girl, and would not tell fortunes for the bad 
men. 

Oh, how angry they were ! They had Paul and Silas beaten and 
put into prison. They told the jailer to keep Paul and Silas 
locked up. 

Do you think Paul and Silas felt badly ? No, indeed. 

They sang hymns to God at midnight. Then suddenly the strong 
prison shook, the doors flew open, and the chains fell off the pris- 
oners. 

I he jailer had gone to sleep, but the shaking waked him, and 
when he saw the doors open he was going to kill himself. He thought 
the prisoners had all run away, and he knew if his prisoners had run 
away, he would be killed. So he was going to kill himself, but Paul 
cried out. " We are all here." 

'I hen the jailer knew that the story Paul had told of Jesus must 



THE JAILER. 



93 



be true, He ran in and kneeling down, cried out, " Sirs, what must I 
do to be saved ? " Paul said, " Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and 
thou shalt be saved," and then in the middle of the night they had a 




THE JAILER. 



prayer-meeting ; and the jailer did believe in the Lord and was baptized 
that same night. 

Bible Readings. — Acts 16 : 14-40. 



94 EPHESIANS BURNING THEIR BOOKS. 

EPHESIANS BURNING THEIR BOOKS. 

Here is another picture about Paul. This tells us about what 
Paul did three years alter he had been shut up in the jail at Philippi. 
You can see by the picture that he is in a large city. It is Ephesus, 
one of the largest cities of Asia. Ephesus was full of great buildings, 
and had one of the seven wonders of the world in it. This was the 
beautiful temple of Diana where the heathen people worshiped. A 
great many people in Ephesus earned their living by being priests of 
this goddess Diana. Books had been written by priests full of wonder- 
ful secrets. These secrets were really mere nonsense, but a man who 
owned one of these books could make a great deal of money. Books 
were not printed in those days, but written, and one book cost hundreds 
of dollars. These books of mamc cost even more. 

o 

Do you think Paul believed in those books? He knew that 
things happened according to God's will, and the best secret is that 
God loves us. He was sorry for the poor deceived people. So He 
lived in Ephesus for three years, telling the good news of the gospel. 
And God, to help the people believe, let Paul heal the sick, and work 
many miracles. Some of the magicians thought they would try to use 
the name of Jesus, and heal the people as Paul did. But the evil 
spirit answered "Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are you ?' 
Then the man in whom the evil spirit was, leaped on them and over- 
came them. \\ hen others heard how the magicians had been punished, 
the}- came to Paul, confessed their sins and believed on the Lord. 

Many also of those men who had the curious books brought their 
books together and burned them. Do you know why they would not 
sell them ? They knew the books were full of cheats and lies. Now 
that they were Christians they could not sell such wicked books. The 
books might keep others from Christ. 

Do you think there are any bad books now ? Yes, indeed ; and 
no matter how pretty a book is, or how much it costs, if it teaches 
things winch are wrong, we must have nothing to do with it. If a bad 
book belongs to us,we should not give it away, for it maythen hurt others; 



EPHESIANS BURJSTIjSTG THEIR BOOKS. 



95 



but we should burn it. Sometimes books which are not really bad, 
are foolish and waste our time. There are so many interesting good 




KPIIKSIANS BURNING THEIR BOOKS. 



books, that we should try to find them, and not read every book that 
happens to come in our way. 

Ask your parents and teachers to help you choose the best books 
for boys and girls. 

Bible Readings. — Acts 19 : 1-20. 



9 6 THE TUMULT AT EPHESUS. 

THE TUMULT AT EPHESUS. 

There were a great many silversmiths who made cunning little 
models or copies of the great temple of Diana. Every one who came 
to Ephesus used to buy one of those silver models to carry home. 
Besides these, the silversmiths made statues of Diana holding a bow. in 
her hand, and heads of Diana. So many people worshiped the 
goddess Diana, that the silversmiths could sell a great many of these 
things, for the people worshiped the little images too. 

But when Paul had preached in Ephesus for three years, these 
silversmiths found they did not sell nearly so many images. Do you 
know why ? One silversmith named Demetrius called a meeting of all 
the men in his trade. He told the men that if Paul was allowed to keep 
on preaching, they would lose their trade. He said, " Not only here in 
Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia, this Paul hath persuaded and 
turned away much people, saying, ' There be no gods, which are made 
with hands.' And so we will soon be unable to sell our images, and 
the temple of the great goddess Diana will be despised." 

Then all the people shouted, and for about two hours they kept 
crying, " Great is Diana of the Ephesians." One of the new Christians, 
a man named Alexander, stood up and beckoned to the people to 
listen to him. Do you see him ? But you can see they are not 
listening. No, indeed ! they kept on shouting, till at last the town- 
clerk made them all go home. The Christians kept Paul out of sight, 
though he wanted to speak to the people. But Paul's friends were 
afraid he might be killed. After the tumult was over, the Christians 
begged Paul to go and preach somewhere else, and lie did leave 
Ephesus. In the picture you can see one of the models of the front 
of the temple of Diana. Do you know that one of the books of the 
Bible is a letter which Paul wrote to the Christians in Ephesus? The 
people who lived at Ephesus were called Ephesians. See if you can 
find Paul's letter and read what he says to little children. 

Bible Readings. — Acts 19 : 23-41 ; Acts 20: [-3 ; Eph. 4 : 25-32; 
Eph. 5:1; Eph. 6: 1-3 13: 10-18 . 




THE TUMULT AT EPHF.SUS. 



9 8 JOHN ON PATMOS. 

JOHN ON PATMOS. 

This old man is John, the beloved disciple of Jesus. John lived 
many years after he saw Jesus ascend to heaven. He lived to be 
nearly one hundred years old. He taught many people about Jesus. 

When John was a very old man, he wrote the story of Jesus' life. 
In this book you can find many of the loving words that he had heard 
Jesus speak. John knew that some people did not believe that Jesus 
was God, and so he wrote in his book, " In the beginning was the 
Word, and the Word was God — and the Word was made flesh and 
dwelt among us." Then he also wrote in his book what Jesus 
said to Philip the night before he was crucified. Philip was one who 
did not understand that Jesus was truly God. 

Philip said to Jesus, " Lord, show us the Father." 

Jesus said to him, "Have I been so long time with you, and 
yet hast thou not known me, Philip ? he that hath seen me hath seen 
the Father. And how sayest thou then, ' Show us the Father ? ' 

John also wrote three short loving letters when he was an old man. 
In one of these letters, he said: 

" Little children, love one another." 

" He that loves not does not know God, for God is love." 

"My little children, let us not love in word only, but in deed and 
in truth." 

But I must tell you where John is in the picture. He is on an 
island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is the island of Patmos. John 
was sent away to live on this island like a prisoner, because he loved 
Jesus. One day while he was on this island, the Lord opened his 
eyes so that he could see into heaven. John saw T Jesus — Jesus was 
even more full of glory and brightness than when He was transfigured. 

" His countenance was as the sun shining in his strength." 

When John saw Jesus, he fell at His feet as if he were dead, be- 
cause the glory was almost too great for him to bear. But Jesus laid 
His hand upon John, and spoke lovingly as when on earth : "Fear 
not; I am lie that livcth, and was dead, and behold I am alive 



JOHN ON PATMOS. 



99 



forevcrmore — write the things which thou hast seen and which are, 




and which shall be hereafter." Then 
Jesus sent messages to the churches. 
John wrote them in a book, and when 
you are older you will love to read 
them all. I think you will enjoy read- 
ing part of the book even now. It 
is the last book in the Bible. 

Bible Readings.- -Rev. i : 1-20; 
7 : 9-1 7 ; 2 1 : 1-27 ; 22 : 1-2 1. 




JESi"> BLESSIXG CHILDREN, 



THE CHILDREN'S BIBLE HOUR 

PART II.— FOR YOUTH 



THE EXPULSION FROM THE GARDEN. 

GENESIS III. 

Did you ever think how many centuries passed while God was preparing the 
earth for Adam ? We read in the first chapter of Genesis that light was created 
on the first day; the firmament on the second; the seas, and grass, and trees on 
the third, and so on; but the study of geology proves that each of these "days" 
means a division of time, not a day in the sense we use the word. The records 
■of the rocks are traced by the finger of the Almighty just as truly as were the 
two Tables of the Law, given to Moses on Mount Sinai, and these records prove 
that thousands of years went by from that moment, " in the beginning," when God 
created the heaven and the earth, and the hour when God the Father said, " Let 
Us make man in Our Image." 

It was just before the creation of man, no doubt, that the garden was pre- 
pared for him. And the rocks, tell us a wonderful thing about this. We learn, 
by the fossil remains of the trees and ferns before the existence of man, that it 
was not till man appeared that God clothed the earth with fields of grain, sweet- 
smelling herbs and flowers, or luscious fruits. There were pine trees and ferns, 
but the lovelier flowers and fruits were called into being- for Adam's delight and 
nourishment. 

Try to imagine this first man and woman in their beautiful home ; learning 
from God how to dress and keep their garden, warned by Him of the dreadful 
punishment that would follow disobedience. But remember that, until they were 
tried and had resisted, Adam and Eve were innocent but not good. True good- 
ness is choosing the right and refusing the wrong; it is resisting evil and ac- 
cepting good. So Satan was allowed to tempt them, and — they chose the evil! 

'The woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of 
the garden. But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God 
hath said, Ye shall not cat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die." 



104 



THE EXPULSION FRO. If THE GARDEN. 



Caedmon; an English poet of the seventh century, in a poetical account of the 
story of Adam's fall, makes Satan say to Eve: 

" Tell Adam," said he, " God has sent me as his vassal 
To tell him he should cat this fruit. 
To increase his understanding, power and strength ; 
To make his body shine like that of angels, and 
His form more beauteous. He will need no treasure i 
In the whole world." 

At first (I am telling you the story in Caedmon's way, not the short account 
in the Bible) Adam will not believe that Satan is sent by God. Satan, who is in 
the form of a serpent, is not like an angel and brings no proof that God has 
sent him. But the serpent talks with Eve alone and tells her God will be angry 
if Me hears that Adam has slandered him (Satan), and that if she eat she will 
grow wise; her "eyes will be so clear they will see even to His throne. - ' So, 
at last, she takes the fruit and tastes it before Adam, who then eats. 

Then, when Satan leaves them, Adam and Eve feel what they have done — 
the air grows chill and cold as it has never been before. 

" And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the 
cool of the day; and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of 
the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden. And the Lord God called unto 
Adam, and said unto him. Where art thou?'' 

Coming out before an angry God! We, who have heard of a Saviour to bear 
that anger for us, cannot guess what they suffered. It must have been almost 
a relief to hear what their punishment was to be. 

The}- were to leave the beautiful garden, and the care of the ground, which had 
been a delight, was to be a labor. "Cursed is the ground, for tin sake . . . 
thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to the< while Eve was told that 
her children should be a sorrow and care to her from their very birth. But they 
are not left without hope. The Saviour is promised, and God Himself clothes 
them in the skins of wild beasts. 

Then they are driven forth; God setting at the gate i^i the garden "cherubim 
and a flaming sword which turned every way to keep the way o( the tree of life." 
A very thoughtful writer says: "Was not the brightness darting its sword-like 
rays on every side the symbol of the presence of (~,oi\? Perhaps in the light ot 




THE EXPULSION FROM THE GARDEN. 



io6 THE EX PC LSI OX FROM THE GARDEN. 

that flaming- sword Adam and Eve often knelt to ask forgiveness, guidance, and 
protection.'' 

Look carefully at the picture and you will see how horrible everything seems 
about the two sinners. Wild beasts growling at them — the very branches of the 
trees seem to take hideous shapes as Adam and his wife pass by. 

What an awful thing sin must be in God's eyes to make such a punishment 
necessarv. So awful that only the sacrifice oi His own Beloved Son could atone 
for it. But since there is a way provided to get back the good that has been 
lost, we need not mourn the fall. The New Paradise of God shall be far beyond 
that Paradise He prepared for our first parents. 

No one supposes that fire was used or needed in the Garden of Eden, but 
surelv when turned out into the bleak world Adam would learn of fire. One 
poet pictures Adam seeing two trees, which had been driven by the wind against 
each other, ignite. He runs from the fire till he reaches a plain ; then turns to 
watch it and enjoys the pleasant heat, finding his muddy dress dry quickly by it 
Again and again he tries to kindle a fire. 

" While (elsewhere musing) one day he sat down 
Upon a steep rock's craggy, forked crown, 
A foaming beast come toward him he espies, 
Within whose head stood beaming coals for eyes ; 
Then suddenly with boisterous arms he throws 
A knotty flint that hummeth as it goes ; 
Hence flies the beast, th' ill-aimed flint-shaft grounding 
Against the rock, and on it oft rebounding, 
Shivers to cinders, whence there issued 
Small sparks of fire, no sooner born than dead. 
This happy chance made Adam leap for glee, 
And quickly calling his cold company, 
In his left hand a shining flint he locks, 
Which with another in his right he knocks, 
So up and down, that from the coldest stone 
At every stroke small fiery sparkles shone. 
Then with the dry leaves of a withered bay, 
The which together handsomely they law 
They take the falling lire, which, like a sun 
Shines clear and smokeless in the leaf begun." 



THE EXPULSION FROM THE GARDEN. 107 

We know that Adam lived to be nine hundred and thirty years old, seeing 
his children and grandchildren to the time of Lamech. Adam had a wonderful 
vitality, but gradually, as his descendants yielded to sin more and more, that 
vitality grew weaker and the term of life shorter. James Montgomery gives a 
beautiful picture of Adam's death. Enoch, he who " walked with God," is sup- 
posed to be speaking. The night was one of awful storm "as if the world would 
perish with our Sire." 

" Closed his eyelids with a tranquil smile, 
And seemed to rest in silent prayer awhile : 
Around his couch in filial awe we kneeled, 
When suddenly a light from heaven revealed 
A SPIRIT, that stood within the unopened door; 
The sword of God in His right hand he bore ; 
His countenance was lightning, and his vest 
Like snow at sunrise on the mountain's crest ; 
Yet so benignly beautiful His form, 
His presence stilled the fury of the storm ; 
At once the winds retire, the waters cease ; 
His look was love, His salutation, Peace ! 

Our Mother first beheld him, sore amazed, 
But terror grew to transport as she gazed : 
'Tis He, the Prince of Seraphim, who drove 
Our banished feet from Eden's happy grove ; 
'Adam, my life, my spouse, awake!' she cried, 
' Return to Paradise, behold thy Guide. 
Oh, let me follow in this dear embrace ! ' 
She sank, and on his bosom hid her face. 
Adam looked up, his visage changed its hue, 
Transformed into an angel's at the view ; 
' I come,' he cried, ' with faith's full triumph fired,' 
And in a sigh of ecstasy expired." 



NIMROD AND ABRAHAM. 

GENESIS X. to XV. 

Many very ancient ruins testify that early in the world's history men delighted 
in building' high towers "whose top may reach unto heaven." One such ruin has 
from the most ancient times been known as Birs Nimrud, or the Tower of Nim- 
rod. This is a bare hill, one hundred and ninety-eight feet high, of yellow sand 
and brick, near the left bank of the Euphrates. On this hill there is a ruined tower 
forty feet high, said to have been repaired by Nebuchadnezzar. 

Herodotus describes a tower of Babylon which may give us some idea of 
the Tower of Babel. It stood in an enclosure twelve hundred feet square and 
was over six hundred feet square at its base, rising to a height of nine hun- 
dred feet. Seven square towers rose one above the other, like gigantic steps, 
each smaller than the one below and colored, successively, black, white, orange, blue, 
scarlet, silver, and gold. The ascent was made by a winding path on the outside, 
with a landing-place and seats for resting about the middle of the way up. In the 
topmost tower was a spacious temple, but the golden image of the god was in the 
lowest tower, on a golden throne, before a golden table, set on a golden floor. 
You may form some idea of the size of this tower by the fact that Alexander the 
Great employed ten thousand men, for two months, in removing the rubbish which 
had fallen from it in his daw 

Jewish tradition says that Nimrod, worshipped as a god l>v the people, wished 
to build a town for his own glory. "Come," he is supposed to say, "let us build 
a great city, and establish ourselves in it, that we may not be scattered over the 
whole earth, and drowned in a flood, as happened to our forefathers. Let us raise 
in the midst of the city a tower so high that no flood could rise above it, s,> 
strong that no fire, should one break out, could destroy it. Yes, let us do still 
more, let us build it up into the heavens, and stay it in them, on .ill its four 
.side>, that it be steady, and that the waters in the sky may not fall on lis.'' 




THE TOWER OF BAP.E1.. 



no NIMROD AND ABRAHAM. 

Though all were not so foolish as to think of conquering heaven, and driving 
God from His throne, yet they complied with Nimrod's wishes. Manx saw in the 
tower a real safeguard against men being scattered, or drowned by a flood. Others 
believed the scheme would advance the idolatry they loved. Therefore, six hundred 
thousand men, among whom were six thousand princes, set to work to build the 
tower and raised it till its top was seventy miles high. . . . When the builders 
ran short of anything it was a year before they could get the material to the top. 

And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children 
of men builded. And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all 
one language ; and this they begin to do : and now nothing will be restrained 
from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there 
confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. So 
the Lord scattered them abroad. 

In striking' contrast to this proud and boastful Nimrod, is Abraham, the Friend of 
God. lie was born in Ur of the Chaldees, so let us look for a moment at that city. 
Its ruins form a vast mound in a plain so flat and low that when the Euphrates rises 
it can only be approached in a boat. But very different was the scene, four thou- 
sand years ago. The city was then flourishing; arts and sciences were cultivated; 
astronomers watched the heavens; poets composed hymns and epics, and patient 
scribes stamped, on soft clay tablets, the books which have, in part, come down to 
our day. For the ancient race which lived in those lands were, beyond most, given 
to writing and reading. The waters of the Euphrates did not then flood the coun- 
try, but spread in a network of sparkling canals and rivulets which carried fertility 
to the whole landscape. The houses, with fanciful designs painted outside, like the 
temple towers, stood on platforms. To shut out the heat, the walls of the better 
class were very thick. The windows were high up and small ; the rooms long, 
narrow, and gloomy, and all opened into one another, while a central arch formed 
the entry from without. Trees planted all round served to protect the inmates from 
the overpowering rays of the sun. Handsome pottery of many kinds abounded, for 
many-shaped jars, lamps, and vessels are found in the old Chaldean graves. Clay 
tablets stamped with figures and groups of men and animals displayed artistic skill, 
and tin- stone-engraver carved designs of human or divine forms on cylinders of 
jasper and other stones; to be used for impressing the device on ^ >it tablets by 
lolling it over them. 



NIMROD AND ABRAHAM. m 

Sun-dials marked the hours of the day, which had- already been divided as. we 
now have them; and the smith and jeweller furnished the field, the camp, the house 
and the person' with a long list of implements, weapons, and ornaments in various 
metals. Chaldea produced neither figs, olives, nor grapes, but the palm made up for 
the lack of these. The fruit of this tree, hanging in clusters of amber or gold, is at 
once pleasant to the eye, delicious and nourishing — the very kernels, when broken 
up, feed the goats. An incision in the stem yields a drink which takes the place 
of wine. The crown, which grows from the top, and the inner fibres and pith, are 
boiled for food. Mats and baskets are made from the leaves, while the stem fur- 
nishes pillars, roofing, and furniture. In Abrahams day it grew almost in forests 
in Chaldea. The whole district, indeed, was amazingly fertile and highly cultivated. 
Shady with palms, tamarisks, and acacias, it was also rich in pomegranates, and 
golden with fields of the finest wheat. Millet grew to a fabulous height, and all 
kinds of corn-plants produced two and even three hundred fold. Think of this city 
and country as you read : 

" By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he 
should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed ; and he went out, not knowing 
whither he went." (Heb. xi., 8.) 

And now as to the religious teaching in Chaldea. Strange to say, some of 
the hymns that Abraham may have heard chanted by the priests in Ur, remain to 
this day. One is addressed to the moon; here are a few lines from it: 

Father mine, of life the giver, cherishing, beholding all ! 

Lord, whose power benign extends over all in heaven and earth ! 

Thou drawest forth from heaven the seasons and the rains ; 

Thou watchest life and yieldest showers ! 

Who in heaven is high exalted ? Thou, sublime is thy reign ! 

Magic had great power in Chaldea. Magicians claimed to avert by spells and 
incantations the malignity of countless genii and evil spirits which filled the air, 
the earth, and the abyss beiow it. 

And, amidst all this idolatry and superstition Abraham grew up! His own 
father, Terah, "served other gods" (Josh, xxiv., 2), but he, in spite of example, and 
(so says tradition) of persecution, worshipped Jehovah. Yet, in the midst of all 
the idolatry, the traditions of Creation, the Flood, and the Confusion of Tongues 



H2 XI MR 0D AND ABRAHAM. 

were preserved ; and in Ur of the Chaldees, the boy Abrain would hear the seventh 
day spoken of as "the day of rest for the heart," on which even the king dared 
not ride out in his chariot, or eat forbidden meats. 

We know from the Bible (Acts vii., 2) that it was while still in Ur that Abra- 
ham reeeived the call from God ; but it was Terah, his father, who took the tribe 
out from Chaldea to the land of Harran — " six hundred miles northwest of Ur as 
the crow flies and much more by the winding" road." It was a journey of months 
from Ur to Harran. " It was a land that might please Terah and Nahor for its 
pastures, and its temples would offer them the idol sanctuaries in which they chose 
to worship," but Abraham was not satisfied. After his father's death he, with his 
nephew Lot, set forth for Canaan — the Land of Promise. Though Abraham never 
called himself a king we must not think of him as travelling" in less than kingly 
state. Dean Stanley gives this picture of the journey: "All their substance that 
they had gotten is heaped high on the backs of their kneeling camels. 'The 
slaves that they had bought in Harran ' run along by their sides. Round them 
are their flocks of sheep and goats, and the asses, moving beneath the towering 
forms of the camels. The chief is there, amidst the stir of movement, or resting 
at noon within his black tent, marked out from the rest by his cloak of brilliant 
scarlet, by the fillet of rope which binds the loose handkerchief round his head, 
by the spear which he holds in his hand to guide the march and to fix the 
encampment. The chiefs wife, the princess of the tribe, is there in her own tent 
(Gen. xxiw, 67) to make the cakes and to prepare the usual meal of milk and 
butter; the slave or the child is ready to bring in the red lentil soup for the 
weary hunter, or to kill the calf for the unexpected guest." 

Abraham, after crossing the great river, passed on to Damascus, where tradi- 
tion says he reigned as a king, and so on to Canaan, where the promise was given, 
"Unto thy seed will I give this land," a promise made when Abraham was child- 
less. "And he believed in the Lord and he counted it to him for righteousness." 
And then by a solemn covenant the promise was renewed and by a virion God 
showed Abraham the future of his nation. "Know of a surety that thy seed shall 
be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, ami shall serve them, and they shall 
afflict them four hundred years; and also that nation whom they .shall serve will 
I judge; and afterward they shall come out with great substance." 



EL KHALIL-ALLAH. 

GENESIS XIII., 1-13; XIV., XVI., XXL, 1-13; and XXII. 

It is as El Khalil-Allah, "The Friend of God," the name by which he is still 
called among his Arab children, that I would write of Abraham in this chapter. 

He had left the heathen city of Ur and lived as a "stranger and sojourner" 
among the people of Canaan. He had, because of a severe drought and famine, 
gone down into Egypt and seen the wonderful palaces and cities of the Pharaohs, 
living for some years, tradition says, in the sacred city of On "where his descend- 
ants lived afterward as slaves." He then returned to the mountain east of Bethel, 
"unto the place of the altar, which he had made there at the first: and there 
Abram called on the name of the Lord." 

And here it is that we see him as "The friend of God." There is a quar- 
rel in the great camp; the herdsmen of Lot (who, though "Abraham's nephew, was 
not very much younger than he) dispute with Abraham's herdsmen, for the pas- 
turage grows scarce. But the man who has God for his Friend cannot quarrel : 
" Let there be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee," says Abraham, though 
he was the chief of the tribe and could have asserted his rights, "for we be breth- 
ren; .... if thou wilt take the left hand, then I will go to the right; or 
if thou depart to the right hand, then I will go to the left." 

As they stood on the mountain they looked down upon a beautiful and 
fertile plain, where cattle could find abundant pasturage, and, close at hand, were 
the cities of the plain, where one could be sure of a market for the produce of 
his flocks. Lot's choice was made at once ; he pitched his tent outside Sodom 
(chief among the cities of the plain), and Abraham moved south to Hebron, where 
"he built an altar to the Lord." Here, at last, he could rest, almost at home in 
this upland vale, with its mingled town and country life, its wells and its clumps 
of oak-trees, amidst the cool and delightful climate of an elevation of nearly 
three thousand feet above the sea. 



ii 4 EL KHALIL- ALLAH. 

The next recorded event in Abraham's life clearly shows that he cherished no 
vexed feeling toward Lot. A messenger comes to tell him Lot has been taken pris- 
oner by an invading army. Abraham gathers his fighting men together (three hun- 
dred and eighteen trained soldiers), asks the help of the Amorite chiefs who live near 
— Mamre, "the manly," Lschol, "the brave," and Aner, "the branch," and. with less 
than a thousand men, went in pursuit of the enemy. The little army surprised the 
great host at night, rushed upon them on three sides, and caused a perfect rout and 
panic. Lot was rescued, besides many others, with much boot}-. Two kings came to 
meet Abraham on his homeward march — the king of Sodom, and Melchizedek the 
king of Salem— "and he," says the Scripture, "was the priest of the most high God." 

From the king of Sodom, who offered him all the booty, Abraham would 
take nothing — the Friend of God needed not to be enriched by a heathen king; 
but he gratefully received Melehizedek's blessing. No one knows who this Mel- 
chizedek was. Professor Geikie says: "It is quite possible that, like Abraham, he 
may have been one of the early Pilgrim Fathers, who had left Chaldea to escape 
the growing bitterness and intensity of idol worship, which were making fidelity 
to the faith of purer ages impossible." 

Ten years Abraham had lived in Canaan, and then, since Sarah had no child, 
she gave Hagar, her "bondwoman," to Abraham as a wife, and Ishmael, "God 
hears," was born. The boy grew up, the darling and pride, no doubt, of the whole 
camp. lie was Abraham*s son — for twelve years the heir. But when the boy was 
just growing into manhood God gave Sarah a child, whom in her delight she 
named Isaac, "laughter." Ishmael, no longer the heir, but "the son of the bond- 
woman," did not give up his place willingly to the laughing boy. At a birthday 
feast Sarah saw him mocking her child, and went at once to Abraham, saying: 
"Cast out this bondwoman and her son; for the son of this bondwoman shall 
not be heir with my son, even with Isaac." 

"And the thing was very grievous in Abraham's sight, because of his son. 
And God said unto Abraham, Let it not be grievous in thy sight, because of the 
lad, and because of thy bondwoman: in all that Sarah hath said unto thee, hearken 
unto lur voice; for in Isaac shall thy seed be called. And also of the son of the 
b.»ndwoman will I make a nation, because he is thy seed. And Abraham rose- 
up early in the morning, and took bread and a buttle of water, and gave it unto 
Hagar (putting it on her shoulder), and the child, and sent her away." 




THE TRIAL OF THE FAITH OF ABRAHAM. 



n6 EL KHALIL- ALLAH. 

To understand the trial that the Friend of God was next called to endure, 
we must not forget what has been written in regard to Ur of the Chaldees. There 
Abraham had seen not only bulls and rams offered in sacrifice, but had looked 
upon human victims. Men had there given "their first-born for their transgres- 
sions." Now, when he had separated himself from the heathen, when he had for 
years looked on the offering of human sacrifice as wrongs now he was told: "Take 
now thy son, thine only son, Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land 
of Moriah ; and offer him there for a burnt-offering upon one of the mountains 
which I will tell thee of." 

Abraham rose up early in the morning, and, taking two of his young men, 
and Isaac his son, went to the place of which God had told him. "Then on the 
third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar off. And Abraham 
said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass; and I and the lad will 
go yonder and worship, and come again to you. And Abraham took the wood 
of the burnt-offering, and laid it upon Isaac his son ; and he took the fire in his 
hand, and a knife : and they went both of them together. And Isaac .... 
said, My father: and he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold the fire 
and the wood; but where is the lamb for a burnt-offering."' 

Our picture represents Isaac as a boy, but he was twenty years of age — " a 
lad" to his father, just as many a young man of twenty and over is a "boy" to 
his parents nowadays, yet a full-grown man, able to resist and therefore a willing- 
sacrifice, allowing his father to bind him to the altar. 

" And Abraham stretched forth his hand and took the knife to slay his son."' 

After twenty-five years of patient waiting for him ! After twenty years, dur- 
ing which he had watched the God-given child grow from babyhood to boyhood. 
from boyhood to manly beauty and strength — after all, it had come to this I St. 
Paul tells tis what it was that nerved the loving father's arm: "By faith Abraham, 
when he was tried, offered up l>aac; .... accounting that God was able to 
rai>e him up, even from the dead." Surely such a man may well be called the 
Father of the Faithful, the Friend of God. 

But a- tin: knife held so unfalteringly was about to fall, "the angel o\ the Lord 

called to him out of heaven, and said Lay not thine hand upon the lad, 

neither do thou anything unto him: lor now I know that thou fearest God, seeing 
that thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me. And Abraham 



EL KHALIL-ALLAH. 117 

lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold, behind him a ram caught in a thicket 
by his horns ; and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a 
burnt-offering in the stead of his son." 

"Henceforth," says Professor Geikie, "it was proved, that the lonely follower of 
Jehovah was not behind the servants of Baal in self-surrender to his God. But 
it was also taught that, while the God of Abraham had a right to demand even 
such a sacrifice as that of an only son, a limit was fixed to the impulse in man 
to offer his best, and a sacredness stamped on human life." 

The next scene in Abraham's life is when, mourning for his beloved wife, he 
meets the "children of Heth," to buy a cave to bury Sarah in. We can picture 
the group, who, in Eastern fashion, met Abraham outside the town-gate, dressed 
in loose gowns, like those of the Assyrians, reaching the ankles, their beards long 
and their hair curled. Compliments pass in oriental style. Abraham is made 
welcome, as a great man, to choose any of their sepulchres, though perhaps then, 
as now, the gift was only a form. An Arab gives his house, field, or horse to- 
day, as in Abraham's time, to the purchaser; but it is well known that this is only 
a form to help him raise the price in the end. " What is that between me and 
thee ? " says the seller, just as Ephron said to Abraham. In the end Abraham 
buys the cave of Machpelah (a double cave, as the name signifies) and the field in 
which it stood, weighing the money before the witnesses. This cave, where un- 
doubtedly rest the remains of the three patriarchs and their wives, lies on the east 
edge of Hebron. A Christian church was built over it, but has been converted 
into a mosque. An outside stair leads up to a floor above the level of the cave, 
and on this are raised empty tombs, as monuments to the dead below. Each is 
enclosed in a separate shrine, closed with gates or railings ; those of the tombs of 
Abraham and Sarah, of silver. The shrine of Abraham is encased in marble, and 
contains a so-called tomb, raised about six feet high and hung with three carpets 
embroidered with gold. The " tombs " of Isaac, Rebecca, Jacob, and Leah are also 
shown, but are much like Abraham's, only not so rich. But the real tombs no one 
is allowed to enter; only one European, an Italian architect, has ever seen more 
than this upper floor, and he only caught sight of white sarcophagi in the cave 
below. 



THE BRIDE FROM HARRAN. 

GENESIS XXIV. 

Isaac, Sarah's gentle, obedient son, did not marry till three years after his 
mother's death. He was then a man of forty years, but he was still " the lad " to 
his father, and it is Abraham who sets to work to find a wife for Isaac. The father 
is very anxious his one son, in whom the nations are to be blessed, should have 
a wife from among his own people ; so he calls Eliezer, his chief servant, and asks 
him to swear by a solemn oath that he will go "to the city of Nahor" — the Harran 
where Abraham himself had lived — to find a wife for Isaac. He seems afraid 
that, unless the man solemnly swears to go to the distant city, he may bring a 
woman from some nearer tribe. Eliezer hesitates: " Peradventure the woman will 
not be willing to follow me into this land : must I needs bring thy son again unto 
the land from whence thou earnest ? " 

But Abraham will not let Isaac leave the land of promise ; nor does he tell 
Eliezer to persuade the girl by any account of Isaac's position as the only son of a 
great chief. The simple faith that has won him the name of El Khalil, relies on God 
alone: "The Lord God of heaven which took me from my father's house . . . 
shall send his angel before thee, and thou shalt take a wife unto my son from thence." 

Eliezer then gives the required oath and starts on his journey, taking "ten 
camels of the camels of his master." 

It is a remarkable fact that, though other less useful animals are praised in 
the Bible, the camel has not one word of commendation given it. The fact is the 
camel is unloving and unloved, lie is quarrelsome, revengeful, and utterly stupid, 
except in the matter of paying back one whom he considers his enemy. Yet he 
is wonderfully adapted for desert life; his feet are fitted for the shifting sand; he 
can cio>e his nostrils at will, so that not a grain of sand can enter them; the 
hump on his back is a lump of fat which supports life for him, when he would 
irve but for that reserved fund, while he has sacs or pouches connected with 




ELIEZER AND REBEKAH 



120 THE BRIDE FROM 1IARRAN. 

his stomach, in which he carries a supply of water. A came! can go easily three 
days without drinking, and longer if necessary. As to food, he likes good living 
as well as the horse or ox, but he can make a comfortable meal off bare branches 
and dried leaves. "About as nutritious," says a traveller, "as if he were to eat a 
green cotton umbrella and a copy of the Times." Some years ago a number of 
camels were imported to Xew York, but all died except one pair, which were taken 
to Nevada, and there flourished, so that there are now a considerable number of 
them in the West. But we must return to Eliezer on the way to Harran. 

He carried with him jewels of silver and of gold, and no doubt one camel 
was provided with a bridal throne, as is still the fashion in the East At last the 
city of Nahor was reached. Bethuel, Nahor's son, was a well-known man, for he had 
shepherds and flocks scattered far outside the city: but Eliezer remembered what 
his master had said as to " the angel " going before, and so asked C*od for a sign 
to guide him. He halted by the well outside the city gate, and asked that the girl 
whom he should choose might give him water in answer to his request, and offer 
also to water his camels. 

In the East, to this day, the daughters of an Arab chief go to the wells for 
water, and the meeting each other at the common well is a pleasant event in the 
day. Eliezer saw- a beautiful young girl go down the steps of the well, fill her 
pitcher, and, lifting it on her shoulder, walk up again. He ran to meet her, and 
said, " Let me sip, I pray thee, a little water out of thy pitcher." But she said, 
promptly and kindly, "drink (not sip), my lord," and she hasted to let down her 
pitcher upon her hand, that he might quench his thirst. " I will draw for tin- 
camels also, until the)' are done drinking," she added. It was no slight trouble to 
go up and down those steps, bearing each time a pitcher of water, which she 
emptied into the trough (frequently still found near such wells), until the camels 
had received enough. 

Here was the very sign I But still Eliezer "held his peace," watching the 
graceful girl. When the camels were satisfied, he took a golden ornament for the 
forehead (still worn in the East), and two armlets, and putting them on the girl, 
as a thank-oik ring for her kindness, asked who was her lather, and whether he 
could find lodging at his house. 

"1 am the daughter of Bethuel," sin- answered; "we have both straw ami prov- 
ender enough, and room to lodge in." 



THE BRIDE FROM IIARRAN. 121 

Eliezer was eagerly welcomed, especially by Laban, Rebekah's brother, who was 
greedy for gain, and therefore attracted by the wealth of the caravan. The description 
of Laban's hospitality is as true of Arabian life now as then. Dr. Robinson, when 
travelling in Palestine, says that his Arab host proposed that a servant should 
wash his feet; "a female Arabian slave accordingly brought water which she poured 
upon our feet, over a large shallow basin of tinned copper, kneeling before us, 
and rubbing our feet with her hands, and wiping them with a napkin." 

11 And there was set meat before him to eat." Even when the host is a man 
of rank, he brings in some particular dish himself, and remains standing during 
the meal, directing the servants. 

But Eliezer cannot eat till he has told them his errand. " I am Abraham's 
servant," he begins — not so humbly as it sounds to us, for to be the confidential 
servant of such a chief was an honor. He tells how God has guided him to 
Rebekah, and finishes by asking for her, as a wife for Isaac. Rebekah herself is 
not consulted ; for, in the East, the consent of the maiden is never sought ; her 
marriage is settled by others for her. The father and mother must agree as to 
the betrothal ; but it is also necessary that Laban should consent to it, for daugh- 
ters cannot be married among Arab tribes, even now, without the approval of their 
brothers. The answer is favorable, and the next morning Eliezer is eager to start 
back. But Laban and the mother say the young girl should tarry at least a few 
days — the thing is so sudden ! Eliezer pleads to go, and they leave it to Rebekah 
to decide. She, caring more for jewels and honor as a chiefs bride than for 
brother or mother, says at once, " I will go." The scene of her departure is often 
repeated in the East. A missionary writes : " The mother comes to take leave. 
She weeps, and tenderly embraces her, saying, ' My daughter, I shall see you no 
more ; remember your mother.' The brother enfolds his sister in his arms and 
promises soon to come and see her. The father is absorbed in thought, and is 
only aroused by the sobs of the party. He then affectionately embraces his daugh- 
ter, and tells her not to fear." As Rebekah had her nurse to accompany her, so, 
at this day, the aya who has from infancy brought up the bride, goes with her to 
the new scene. She is her adviser, her assistant, and friend, and to her she will 
tell all her hopes and all her fears. 

When, after many days, they approached the end of their journey, they saw 
a man walking alone. Rebekah, as the custom still is in the East, gets down 



122 THE BRIDE FROM HARRAN. 

from her camel before the stranger, and when Eliezer tells her " It is my master," 
she veils herself, for the husband must not see his bride for the first time before 
others. 

" And Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah's tent, and took Rebekah, and 
she became his wife, and he loved her; and Isaac was comforted after his mother's 
death." 

Isaac's life was very different from cither his father's or that of his sons. He 
never left the Promised Land. Once, when there was a famine in Canaan, he 
seems to have thought of going down to Egypt, as his father had done, but the 
Lord appeared unto him, and said: "Go not down into Egypt," and he obeyed. 
lie was fond of farming and very successful in it, the Bible recording that he 
reaped "an hundred fold." He was patient and gentle; for, when the Philistines 
filled up the wells which Abraham had dug, Isaac did not make the matter a cause 
for quarrelling, but dug them again. Rather than have any contention, he gave up 
a living spring to the Philistines and moved to another place. He seems never 
to have had the trials that tested his father and his son Jacob, but to have led a 
peaceful life, quietly and faithfully serving the God of his father Abraham. He 
was so obedient that he put his life in his father's hands ; so unsuspicious that 
Rebekah, deceitful and partial, found it easy to mislead him ; so devout that even 
those whom he thought were his enemies came to beg him to enter into a cove- 
nant with them, because, they said, " we see certainly that the Lord is with thee." 




JACOB, THE SUPPLANTER; 
ISRAEL, THE PRINCE. 

GENESIS XXV., 19, to CHAP. XXXVI. 

Abraham had his wish — Isaac was married to " a daughter of his people ; " 
Sarah's tent was occupied again, her place filled. But again was Abraham's faith 
tried. He was assured that in his seed the nations should be blessed, and yet, 
for twenty years, Isaac had no children. What rejoicing there must have been 
when, at last, their prayers were heard, and God gave Rebekah two boys. 

Twin babies ! we always think of such as loving each other, and never quar- 
relling; yet, in real life, it is often far different. These twins were not at all alike 
in appearance or character. Esau, the first-born, was the rougher and stronger 
of the two ; his red hair grew low on his neck and chest, and the hair on his 
hands and arms was unusually thick, so that a sensitive touch could feel it. Jacob 
had smoother skin. As boys, Esau seemed the more promising of the two. He was 
frank and generous; Jacob was crafty and mean. Jacob was Rebekah's darling; but 
Isaac, quiet and delicate himself, delighted in his strong, manly Esau, the shaggy, dar- 
ing hunter. Both, for sixteen years, had the privilege of. having their grandfather 
Abraham with them ; but Jacob alone seems to have profited by this, for he it was that 
longed for "the blessing" — that mysterious blessing that was to extend to all nations. 

Every boy growing into manhood may well study these two characters. Esau, 
free, easy, frank, and good-natured ; Jacob, crafty, deceitful, timid. " Yet, fickleness, 
unsteadiness, weakness, want of faith, and want of principle ruin and make use- 
less Esau's noble qualities ; whilst steadfast purpose, resolute sacrifice of the pres- 
ent to the future, and fixed principle, purify, elevate, and turn to lasting good 
even the bad qualities of the younger brother." 

One day when the two brothers were young men, Esau came home late, 
after the evening meal. Now, in the East, even to this day, no food is kept 



124 JACOB, THE SUPPLANTER; ISRAEL, THE PRINCE. 

from one day to another, owing" to the heat ; even bread is baked fresh for each 
meal, and luxuries are seldom used. It chanced that Jacob was preparing a dish 
of red lentils. Esau, faint from long- fasting, did not feci able to prepare food for 
himself, or even to wait till it was made ready. In his impulsive way, he declared 
he was dying of hunger. Jacob, watching his chance, as boys say, asked him to sell 
his birthright for the pottage, and Esau consented. 

Years went by. Esau married, at fort}-, a daughter of Heth; a thing which 
was a sore grief to Isaac and Rebekah. Isaac, grown old and blind and feeble, 
thought his death was drawing near; and, wishing to give Esau his blessing, told 
him to kill venison, make a dish of savory meat for him, and bring it to him. For 
years he had delighted in Esau's venison, and perhaps it was to please his son 
that he expressed a wish for it. Esau goes off, but Rebekah has heard, and now 
she calls Jacob to her. Her dearest boy must have the blessing, at any cost. She 
tells Jacob to bring her two kids, and she will so cook them that Isaac, whose taste 
is not keen, will never know them from venison. 

Jacob hesitates : " My father peradventure will feel me, and I shall seem to 
him as a deceiver, and I shall bring a curse upon me, and not a blessing." But 
Rebekah, ruling her son as she has ruled her husband, says : " Upon me be thy 
curse, my son : only obey my voice." 

The meat prepared, Rebekah makes Jacob put on Esau's raiment. Clothed in 
Esau's garments, with the soft hair of the kids laid on his neck and hands, Jacob 
takes in the savory food to his father. How Rebekah's heart must have beat 
when the gentle old man said, "Come near, I pray thee, that I may feel thee, my 
son, whether thou be my very son Esau, or not," and how she rejoiced when, hav- 
ing felt the hairy hands, he gave her Jacob the longed-for blessing. Ah ! foolish 
woman! she was to be punished for her deceit. Esau coming in with his venison 
tells .of the cheat, exclaiming, "Is he not rightly named Jacob, the Supplanter?" 

But the great blessing has been given, and [saaC can only promise Esau, 
'• Behold, thy dwelling shall be the fatness of the earth, ami of the dew of heaven 
from above." 

Soon Rebekah begins to reap the fruit of her wrong-doing; Esau looks with 
hatred on his brother, and plans to kill him. The mother, hearing of this, tells 
facob he must go and stay at I Iarran with her brother Laban until she sends 
him word — a word that never came, for Rebekah died without seeing her boy 




ISAAC BLESSING JACOB. 



126 JACOB, THE SUP PLANTER; ISRAEL, THE PRIXCE. 

ain The reason given to Isaac for this journey is, that Jacob is to go to Har- 
ran to find a wife, so he gives him again " the blessing of Abraham." 

How Rebekah must have thought of Eliezer and his company as she saw her 
son go off. Jacob went alone on foot, with only his staff. He walked on till, 
at Luz, the night coming on, he lay down to rest. No doubt he felt unhappy 
enough; no doubt he longed for forgiveness, and that the blessing so wrongly 
won might truly be his; for there God gave him a wonderful dream, showing him 
that the angels are ministering spirits, sent clown to earth on errands of mercy ; 
and there he heard God's voice, telling him, " I am the Lord God of Abraham thy 
father and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, 
and to thy seed. And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places 
whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land." 

When Jacob waked in the morning he set up the stone on which he had 
rested as a pillar, calling the place Bethel, the house of God ; and from that day 
he began to serve God. He made many mistakes — committed many sins after 
that, but he was never again " the Supplanter," and, after years of trial, earned his 
glorious name of Israel, a Prince of God. 

After many days, Jacob saw, far off, the city of Nahor . and, coming to a well, 
sat down to rest. This was not the well outside the city, for that had steps, 
down which Rebekah descended with the pitcher on her shoulder, but one at some 
distance in the fields, where the flocks were feeding. Dore has given us a good 
picture of such a well in the one representing Eliezer meeting Rebekah. These 
wells were always covered by a great stone, to keep the water cool, and, until 
all who had a right to use it were gathered near, the stone was not taken away. 
Some of the first-comers told Jacob that Rachel, Laban's daughter, was coming to 
water her father's sheep. Jacob saw her, rolled the heavy stone away, watered her 
flock for her, and then, telling her he was Rebekah's son, kissed her 

From that moment Jacob loved Rachel ; loved her so dearly, that, though 
Laban made him work seven years before he could marry her, the time seemed 
short, since he could see her, and talk with her Laban's crafty, selfish conduct 
was a good lesson to Jacob — no doubt he often thought o( how lie had bargained 
with Esau. But, after the sewn years, Laban veiled Leah, and married her to 
Jacob. When Jacob angrily upbraids him. Laban tells him that the custom of the 
country is that the eldest sifter must many first, but says [acob may have Rachel 



'JACOB, THE SUPPLANT ER; ISRAEL, THE PRINCE. \2j 

too as a wife, if he will promise to work seven years more in payment, Jacob 
consents, and both sisters are given to him. Leah is described as blear-eyed, but 
she was gentle and good, and God blessed her giving her children to love her 

At last, after twenty years, the Lord said unto Jacob, " Return unto the land 
of thy fathers, and to thy kindred, and I will be with thee." " Then Jacob rose 
up, and set his sons and his wives upon camels. And he carried away all his cattle, 
and all the goods which he had gotten, . . . for to go to Isaac his lather in 

the land of Canaan." Even after twenty years Jacob feared to meet his brother 
and sent messengers before him. An Eastern missionary writes; "I almost think 
I hear Jacob telling his servants what they were to say to Esau. He would re- 
peat it many times over, and then ask, ' What did I say ? ' until he had com- 
pletely schooled them into the story. They would be most attentive, and, at every 
interval, some of the most officious would be repeating the tale. The head ser- 
vant, however, would be specially charged with the delivery of the message. When 
they went into the presence of Esau they would make much of Jacob's saying, 
1 The present is sent unto my lord.' .... He, feeling himself thus acknowl- 
edged as lord, seeing the servants of his brother before him, and knowing that 
all of his people had witnessed the scene, would consider himself greatly honored.' 

The servants returned, saying that Esau was coming to meet his brother with 
four hundred men. Jacob was greatly troubled; but he had learned where to look 
for help, and turned to the God whom he had promised to serve so many years be- 
fore. He acknowledged his unworthiness, but claimed the promised blessing. The 
next day he sent large presents of camels and sheep and oxen, that Esau might 
receive the gifts before they should meet, a custom still kept up in the East ; 
and that night he prayed again. We are told that One wrestled with him, whom 
Jacob refused to let go till he gave Him a blessing. The stranger asked his name, 
and said, "Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel - for as a Prince 
hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed/' The worldly Jacob 
had at last become the saintly Israel. He who had power with God need not fear 
his brother, Esau met him lovingly, exchanging presents with him. As the elder 
brother did not care to till the fields that Isaac had planted, there was no strife 
between them. After Jacob had been settled in the vale of Shechem for some 
years, Rachel, his dearly loved wife, died, leaving a baby boy (his twelfth son), 
whom he called Benjamin, and loved only less than his darling Joseph. 



SOLD INTO SLAVERY. 

GENESIS XXXVII. and XXXIX. 

Joseph was Jacob's eleventh son, and for fifteen years the youngest child ; so 
it is not surprising that he was his father's favorite. What is rather surprising is 
that he was not spoiled by the petting. It did not do him any good, though, for 
we read of his telling tales about his older brothers, which could not have been 
any more right then than now. But, though perhaps a little spoiled by unwise 
partiality, Joseph was a manly, God-fearing, obedient boy. God sent him wonder- 
ful dreams, which he seemed to understand, or at least, value, even when a boy. 
Two of these dreams he repeated to his brothers, and they were not at all pleased 
with them. 

Jacob's sons were shepherds and farmers, and Joseph was trained by the older 
brothers in the care of the flocks, and taught to reap and bind the grain. Though 
Jacob showed partiality in dressing Joseph in a coat with sleeves and reaching to the 
feet, while the other sons wore short, sleeveless coats, he was not so foolish as to 
let the boy grow up in idleness. One of the dreams which Joseph told his brothers 
refers to his daily life. "Behold," he said, "we were binding sheaves in the field; 
and lo ! my sheaf arose, and also stood upright; and behold, your sheaves stood 
round about and made obeisance to my sheaf" 

It was easy to interpret such a dream, — the mere fact of the boy telling it 
gave it value — so the brothers, already envious of Joseph's coat, and the special 
favor shown to him, snecringly replied, " Shalt thou indeed reign over us ? or 
shall thou have dominion over us?" And they hated him yet the more for his 
dreams and for his words. 

He was a willing, obedient lad; for when his father proposed to send him to 
Shechem to see how matters were going with, the elder brothers, though he must 
have often experienced unkindness from them, he answered promptly, "Here am I." 
How little the bo) or tin- old man foresaw, as they kissed each other good bye, 




JOSEPH SOLD INTO EGYPT. 



130 SOLD INTO SLAVERY. 

that nearly fifteen years were to go by before they should meet again. How good 
it was that they did not know I for Joseph needed to go through those years of 
trouble, to save his people and to learn to trust only in God. • 

So the boy started out, wearing his sleeved and embroidered coat; which, per- 
haps, was a sign that he was to be the heir; to have peculiarly, "the blessing of 
Abraham." It was no small journey for a boy of seventeen, for Shechem was sixty 
miles from Hebron, but no doubt Joseph knew the road well, and had friendly 
intcreourse with some of the people living by the way. He saw no sign of his 
brothers and their flocks at Shechem, and heard that they had gone about ten 
miles farther north, to Dothan. He followed on at once, catching sight of them 
in the far distance; while one of the brothers, happening to look toward the south, 
saw the familiar figure in the coat which distinguished him from other shepherd lads. 

"Behold the Dreamer!" he exclaims. Oh, how lightly brothers fall into the 
habit of sneering and calling each other names! How the words lead to actions; 
till, now and again, we are startled to hear that a man has betrayed or murdered 
his own brother! As Joseph walked toward them, no doubt he knew that teasing 
and sneering, perhaps even blows, awaited him ; but little did he suspect the truth. 
Even when the wicked brothers had bound him, and lowered him into one of the 
dry wells or cisterns that were so frequent in that country, he probably thought it 
was only a little rougher treatment than usual. He hears them talking at their 
meal — eating the very food he has brought them, and giving him none. Then he 
hears a distant sound. Ah, some one is coming — a company — for, far down in 
the earth as he is, Joseph can hear the murmur of the approaching caravan. He 
prays to God for help, and listens. God has heard. They are coming to get him 
out. But what is his horror to find that he is only drawn up to be sold as a 
slave. Boor boy! he feels as if God has deserted him. He begs and prays, but it 
is of no u.^e. The money is counted out, and he is hurried away. "Now see what 
will become of your dreams!" the brothers cry, tauntingly; but the cry i*> a re- 
minder. He tries to pray to Him who has sent him those "Visions in the night," 
and grows calmer 

It was a company of Ishmaelites who had bought Joseph. They were going 
down into Egypt with spices, which always commanded a ready sale, as great 
quantities were used in embalming and for incense The merchants paid about 
fifteen dollars for the lad, the usual price for a slave of Joseph's age. Syrian, or 



SOLD INTO SLAVERY. 131 

white slaves, were particularly valued in Egypt in Joseph's time, and he was prob- 
ably treated very kindly by the Ishmaelites, as he would be more valuable if bright 
and well. 

The first sight of an Egyptian city must have interested Joseph, in spite of his 
homesickness and anxiety. Here is a description of Memphis, the city where Joseph 
lived as a slave: 

" Memphis, the capital of the Empire in the time of Joseph, lay on the west 
side of the Nile, about twelve miles south of the present Cairo. Its area, like that 
of all Eastern cities, was large in proportion to its population, embracing a circuit 
of at least fifteen miles; but in this was included much open ground, laid out as 
gardens, besides space for public buildings, temples, and palaces, and the barracks 
of the garrison, in the quarter known as the 'White Castle.' Within the walls 
stood the old palace of the kings, a stately structure of brick, with courts, corri- 
dors, chambers, and halls without number, verandah-like out-buildings of gaily 
painted wood, and a magnificent pillared banqueting hall. Beautiful gardens sur- 
rounded it, and a whole host of laborers tended the flower-beds and shady alleys, 
the shrubs and the trees, or kept the tanks clean, and fed the fishes. The climate 
was wonderfully healthy, and the soil fertile, while the views from the walls were 
famous among both the Greeks and the Romans. Bright green meadows stretched 
round the city, threaded everywhere by canals, thick with beds of the lotus flower. 
Trees of such girth that three men could not encircle them with outstretched arms 
rose in clumps ; the wide gardens supplied Rome with roses even in winter, and 
the gay vineyards yielded wine of which even the poets sang.'' 

It was in this beautiful city that Joseph was sold to Potiphar, who was the 
"Captain of the Guard" — that is, the head officer over all the police of the city. 
Every wealthy family in Egypt had a confidential slave who was put in charge of 
the house-servants. Paintings show us that wherever grain is being measured or 
metal weighed, or building or agricultural work is going forward, the head over- 
seer of the household is found with a short rod, or a writing-tablet in his hand 
and a pen behind his ear, to take down the number of sheaves, or of casks, or of 
the cattle or flocks, and, like Joseph, he is expressly described as "the overseer.'' 

We know, from the inscriptions and pictures on their tombs, just how Egyp- 
tians lived in the time of Joseph. The following is a description of such a house 
as Potiphar's: "The mansions of noble Egyptians stood within high walls, deco- 



i 3 2 SOLD INTO SLAVERY. 

rated with paintings ; the entrance being by a huge gate, flanked at each side by 
lofty poles from which floated long streamers. The gate opened on a wide, paved 
court-yard, along the sides of which ran covered walks, supported on slender, 
painted, wooden columns. A second high doorway at the back of this court led 
into the vast gardens of the mansion, with rows of fruit trees and trellised vines, 
clumps of shrubs, beds of flowers and of vegetables. Palms, sycamores, and acacia 
trees, figs, pomegranates, and jasmine grew in luxuriance; a large tank in the mid- 
dle of the ground supplying abundant water for the roots of the trees and for the 
plants, and numerous gardeners seeing that all were duly cared for, and that the 
canals which led the water from the Nile were kept full by the labors of oxen, 
turning water-wheels into them day and night. 

"At one side of this paradise rose the mansion, sometimes of vast extent, but 
generally but one story high. Almost all the rooms on the ground floor had sepa- 
rate doors, opening into a verandah supported by colored wooden columns, and 
running the whole length of the garden side of the house. A long row of store- 
rooms, running at a right angle to this, closed the view behind, and hid away the 
garden produce, the wine jars, and the larder of the establishment. The outside of 
the mansion, like the enclosing wall, was decorated with paintings or ornamental 
designs. 

"The furniture was in keeping with the building. Couches, sofas, and lounges, 
often of precious woods encrusted with ebony or ivory and set off with gilding, 
were beautifully carved into the shapes of lions, sphinxes, horses, and other ani- 
mals, and there was a profusion of tables of all sizes and designs, and elegantly 
carved chairs. On the sideboard, tables, and consoles stood artistically worked 
drinking vessels of many forms ; beautiful vases of gold, bronze, rock-crystal, or 
other precious material, filled with flowers, were everywhere. The foot sank in the 
thick carpets that covered the floors, or trod on the skins of lions and other beasts. 
Troops of slaves and officials waited upon their lord; a band of priests took charge 
of the religious rites of the household, and crowds of servants, male and female, 
fulfilled the different duties of their stations." 

In such a house as this we leave Joseph as confidential slave. 



FROM A PRISON TO A PALACE. 

GENESIS XXXIX., XL., and XLI. 

Joseph did not long enjoy the honors and privileges of his position as over- 
seer of Potiphar's household. A false charge was brought against him. He could 
not prove himself innocent of abusing the trust which his master had confided to 
him, and was thrown into prison in a great citadel, called the White Castle. But 
even here his good conduct won him friends; and soon the jailor, finding he could 
trust him, let Joseph have many privileges. He seems to have helped attend on 
other prisoners; for, noticing one day that two men, who were confined together, 
were particularly sad, Joseph asked them what was their trouble. When you read 
of these men as the chief butler and baker, you must understand that they were 
cultivated Egyptian gentlemen. 

Mohammedans have a tradition as to the imprisonment of these two officials 
which is worth repeating. "A foreign king, then at war with Egypt, sent an am- 
bassador, seemingly for the purpose of negotiating a peace, but in reality to seek 
the means of killing the Egyptian sovereign. A woman of his own country, living 
in Egypt, whom he consulted, told him that the best course of proceeding was to 
bribe either the chief cook or the chief butler to poison his master. The ambas- 
sador therefore made the acquaintance of both ; but, finding the chief cook the 
more tractable, he at last succeeded by a bribe in gaining him over to his pur- 
pose. He then prepared for his departure, and called on his countrywoman, 
intending to tell her of the chief cook's promise. She was not alone, and he 
could only say that he had every reason to be gratified by his success. These 
words of the ambassador soon reached the ears of the king; and as they could 
not be referred to his mission, since the negotiation for peace had come to 
nothing, a secret of some kind was suspected. The woman was tortured until she 
confessed all she knew; but, as she could not say which of the two was guilty, 
the king commanded that both the chief cook and the chief butler should 



154 FROM A PR IS OX TO A PALACE. 

be cast into prison until it could be found out which had accepted the bribe." 
The prisoners had each had a dream, and were feeling particularly sad because 
they could not obtain their interpretations from a priest. Egyptians attached great 
importance to dreams, and their priests professed to interpret them by consulting 
holy books, and performing magical rites. How strangely to the superstitious Egyp- 
tians must have sounded the young prisoner's answer to their craving for an in- 
terpreter: "Do not interpretations belong to God? Tell me them, I pray you." 

The butler dreamed that he plucked grapes from three branches, pressed the 
juice into Pharaoh's cup, ami gave the drink to the king. Joseph, on hearing the 
butler's dream, told its meaning: "Yet within three days shall Pharaoh lift up thine 
head and restore thee unto thy place, and thou shalt deliver Pharaohs cup into his 
hand after the former manner when thou wast his butler ; " adding an earnest ap- 
peal to the officer to remember him (Joseph) when he is restored. The way in 
which he refers to his past life is a lesson to us; he tells the facts, but mentions 
no names — he was cured of tale bearing! "For, indeed, I was stolen away out of 
the land of the Hebrews, and here also have I done nothing that the)- should put 
me into the dungeon." How well it was that he did not complain of his brothers, 
for then Pharaoh would have disliked them and would have refused to see them. 

The baker's dream was next interpreted. How hard it must have been to tell 
the poor man that in three days he was to be killed, and his body exposed to 
the vultures. Death itself was really nothing to an Egyptian, compared to refus- 
ing to embalm his body; for they believed that the existence of the soul depended 
upon the preservation of the bod)'. 

In three days the great national holiday of the birthday of the king' occurred. 
The king was worshipped as divine, and so his birthday was most sacred. On 
that day many prisoners were released, and all happened as Joseph had foretold. 
We can imagine how he hoped and longed to hear from the butler. " He is too 
busy yet, I won't expect it to-day," he would say to himself, to keep up hope. 
But, as months went by, as a year passed on, and then became two, Joseph de- 
spaired, and knew that he was forgotten. 

, by the chief butler; but "God hail him in remembrance," and he grew 
to depend entirely upon the God of Abraham, of Isaac, ami of Jacob. 

Suddenly there is a great -til' and commotion in the prison of the White 
I tie. Messengers from Pharaoh are enquiring for Joseph. lie is given to a 




JOSEPH INTERPRETING PHARAOH'S DREAM. 



i 3 6 FROM A PRISON TO A PALACE. 

company of priests, who, to his surprise, begin to purify or "cleanse" him, as if he 
himself were a priest ! What does it mean ? 

"The king has had a strange dream; no one can divine it, and his chief butler 
declares that you are a wonderful interpreter. But beware! a slave who pretends 
to priestly knowledge, must prove that knowledge good, or is punished by instant 
death." Does Joseph tremble ? No ; he has begun to see that the " hand of the 
Lord bringeth mighty things to pass," and has learned, by long experience, that it 
is good that "a man should hope, and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord." 

The purification that Joseph had to undergo, was the shaving of every hair 
from his head and person; and being bathed and clothed in spotless linen. The 
hair and beards of Egyptians were always false, as no one could approach Pharaoh 
unless perfectly shaved. 

At last all is ready; the young man stands before Pharaoh, who says, "I have 
heard say of thee that thou canst understand a dream, to interpret it." 

How calmly Joseph turns aside any claim to merit or sanctity. "It is not in 
me ; GOD shall give Pharaoh an answer of peace." Then he listens, as Pharaoh 
tells him of the seven fat kine who were devoured by the seven lean kine. and 
of the seven full ears consumed by the seven blasted ears. Without a moment's 
hesitation Joseph tells the meaning of the dream: "Behold, there come seven years 
of great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt; and there shall arise after them 
seven years of famine; and all the plenty shall be forgotten in the land of Egypt, 
and the famine shall consume the land." 

It was, no doubt, because the interpretation was so terrible that the priests 
had not dared to give it, even if they had some suspicion of it. It was not easy 
to tell the king that his kingdom was to suffer from a terrible famine. Here is 
an account of such a famine as Joseph foretold, which will help us to realize what 
an awful prophecy it must have been to Pharaoh. "The famine began. Large 
numbers emigrated. The poor ate carrion, corpses, and dogs. They went further, 
devouring even little children. The eating of human flesh became so common as 
to excite no surprise; the people spoke and heard of it as an indifferent thing. 
As for the number of the poor that perished from hunger ami exhaustion, God 
alone knows what it was. A traveler often passed through a large village without 
seeing a single living inhabitant In one village we saw the dwellers of each house 
extended dead; — the husband, the wife, and the children. The road between Egypt 






FROM A PRISON TO A PALACE. 137 

and Syria was like a vast field, sown with human bodies; or, rather, like a plain 
which has just been swept by the scythe of the mower. It had become as a ban- 
quet hall for the birds, wild beasts, and dogs, which gorged on their flesh.'* 

If Joseph had had no relief to offer, his interpretation would have been terri- 
ble ; but he adds, "Now, therefore, let Pharaoh look out a man, discreet and wise, 

and set him over the land of Egypt and take up the fifth part of the 

land of Egypt in the seven plenteous years." 

Pharaoh at once replies: "Forasmuch as God hath showed thee all this, there 
is none so discreet and wise as thou art. Thou shalt be over my house, and 
according unto thy word shall all my people be ruled. Only in the throne will I 
be greater than thou." So, in one short hour, the imprisoned slave is made next 
in rank to the king. He receives Pharaoh's signet ring; is admitted to the order 
of the priests; and, placed in the second royal chariot, is driven through the streets 
of Memphis, that all may know they are to be ruled by him. He is given an 
Egyptian name : Zaphnath Paaneah, " the man to whom secrets are revealed." 
And, as a crowning honor, he is married to Asenath, the daughter of the high 
priest of On. This was the time of temptation to Joseph, for he was young — not yet 
thirty — and raised suddenly to power and glory. But, through all, he never forgot 
that he was the servant of God. " God did send me," seems the motto of his life. 
When his first-born is laid in his arms, he cries out, "God hath made me forget my 
sorrow;" and when another son is given, he still thanks God who has so blessed him. 

His was a busy, happy life. He travelled " throughout all the land 

and gathered up all the food of the seven years," and then stood ready to preserve 
life, by the help of God. A life that is full of thought for others, of high aims and 
lofty purposes, whether it be spent on a throne or in a garret, is a happy life. Look 
through the record of history. Those kings and rich men are happy who arc em- 
ployed in doing good, in helping those to right who suffer wrong, or in learning 
something of the great secrets of Nature; while, from Bible times to this day, kings 
and common men, who have lived simply to enjoy themselves — to heap up riches, 
and to oppress the poor — have lived feverish, unsatisfactory lives, and generally ended 
miserably. Which would you choose? Like Joseph, feeling that God has sent you 
before, to save life, and living for others; or, like Herod, craving riches and distinc- 
tion, till he hears the shout of " a God — a God ! " and, taking the glory to him- 
self, perishes miserably? 



TESTED AND FORGIVEN. 

GENESIS XLII., XLIII., WAY., XLV. 

We must now turn back to the old man waiting for the return of his favorite 
boy. It may be Jaeob feels uneasy after the lad has passed out of sight, and 
summons a servant to recall him. Then he shakes his head, and says to himself, 
"Let him go — the boy must do a man's work. Rachel would not have me spoil 
him if she were here;" and he tries to forget his uneasiness in playing with little 
Benjamin. But at last a servant tells him, "Master, thy sons approach;" and the 
father hurries out to see them coming up the hill. What a goodly sight they 
are. How proud he feels of his twelve sons. He looks for Joseph's boyish figure — 
so different from the bearded men — but cannot find it. No matter — a moment 
more, and Rachel's boy will be by his side. 

"Father, this have we found," says Simeon, holding up a torn, bloody gar- 
ment; "know now whether it be thy son's coat or no." With beating heart Jacob 
holds the tattered cloth. Ah, he knows too well whose it is. " It is my son's 
coat," he cries, "an evil beast hath devoured him. Joseph is without doubt rent 
in pieces!" and he mourns, refusing comfort. 

How much more than (osepli are the guilts' brothers to be pitied I An un- 
confessed sin, how heavy a burden it is! But yet, as years go by, life goes on, 
and sometimes they have almost forgotten the awful sin. At last comes a time 
of famine. Strangers, passing, tell how, in Egypt alone, there is corn; and the 
brothers look guiltily at each other, blushing at the mere name o( Egypt. But 
when things grow very desperate, Jacob himself insists on their going down into 
Egypt to buy corn. He sends all but Benjamin. lie, ever since that dreadful day 
when, a child of tw<> years eld, he was told "Joseph is not," has never gone far 
from home, but is cherished tenderly, the one child of Jacob's old age. 

Twelve years have made .some changes en each of those ten faces, but their 
costume easily distinguishes them. The simple shepherds feel awkward and coun- 




JOSEPH MAKING HIMSELF KNOWN TO HIS BRETHREN. 



i 4 o TESTED AND FORGIVEN. 

tryfied in the great city of Memphis, and would gladly buy corn of some mer- 
chant; but they are told that no one but the great Zaphnath-paaneah has corn 
to sell. So, tremblingly, shamefaced 1}', they enter the king's palace, and bow 
down before this great man. "And Joseph knew his brethren.' How their shep- 
herd's dress, their staves, their beautiful long beards, recall the old home scenes. 
There is Reuben, — he almost calls him by name, — but he remembers in time. As 
the\" bow down, his heart swells with love and pity; — how, in spite of themselves, 
they are fulfilling his dream! With a beating heart, he sees that no boy is among 
them; and, speaking through an interpreter, accuses them of being spies, knowing 
that at that word they will give their full history. At once comes the longed-for 
answer. " Thy servants are twelve brethren, the sons of one man in the land of 
Canaan, and behold, the youngest is this day with our father, and one is not." 

Then Joseph, impatient for a sight of Benjamin, pretends to still think them 
spies, and insists that one shall return and bring the youngest brother. On their 
refusing this, they are thrown in prison for three days. Then he calls them again, 
and tells them that they can return if they consent to leave one brother as a 
hostage in his hands. How his heart swells and the tears rise as he hears them, 
in real penitence, say: "We are verily guilty concerning our brother, in that we 
saw the anguish of his soul and we would not hear; therefore is this distress 
come upon us." 

At last Simeon is left, and the others return to bring Benjamin. Joseph com- 
mands that each man's money shall be put in his sack, and there, to their dismay, 
they find it on their arrival. Jacob refuses to give up Benjamin, till, at last, 
death from starvation is so near, that he is driven to let his darling go. The 
old father himself sends a little present to the great man ; (think how Joseph 
must have treasured that 'Tittle balm and a little honey, spices, myrrh, nuts, and 
almonds,") and once more they reach Egypt, talking sadly of the sin that has 
weighed so heavily of late on their hearts. 

To their astonishment and bewilderment, instead of being received in the 
public reception room of the palace, they are told that the great man wishes to 
meet them at his own house, at dinner! They stare in dismay; and indeed it 
is no won'der, for a state dinner, in the claws of Egypt's greatness, was a very 
grand and formal affair. "The dining chamber was a decorated hall, resplendent 
with color and gilding:, and furnished witli regal magnificence. Slaves laid gar- 



TESTED AND FORGIVEN. 141 

lands of roses round the shoulders of the guests, and put wreaths of lotus blossoms 
on their heads, while others handed them wine and food from side-boards, loaded 
with every delicacy, and decked with flowers. Choirs of musicians entered the 
chamber during the dessert, and played on harps, lutes, small drums, and flutes, the 
conductor beating time with his hands, and the company joining with measured 
clappings." 

The brothers are so troubled about the money which they had found in their 
sacks, that they go to the entrance of Joseph's house and assure his overseer of 
their honesty. The steward, or overseer, quiets their fears, assuring them that 
their God must have returned the money, as he had received the payments 
himself So, somewhat relieved, they come to the dinner, bringing with them 
their father's present. 

Joseph controls himself, asking after his father: "The old man of whom ye 
spake, is he yet alive?" but when he catches sight of the boy of fourteen, whom 
he had last fondled as a baby of two, he has to hurry from the room to hide 
his tears. 

At last they are all seated — each one according to his age, as the brothers 
notice with surprise. Joseph, being high in rank, eats alone, and the Egyptian 
guests have a separate table, for an Egyptian could not eat with a foreigner. 
But Joseph sends portions from his table to each of the strangers, only heaping 
the most upon Benjamin. The feast was, after all, a very pleasant one, and, 
having bought their corn, the eleven sons start on their homeward way. But 
hardly had they gone a half day's journey when they hear shouts and cries, and, 
looking back, see Joseph's overseer hurrying after them, with a number of men 
and officers. They wait for him, and, to their surprise, he breaks out into a 
torrent of reproach. "After the kindness our lord showed you, how dared you 
steal his cup ?" 

"His cup?" they exclaim. "What do you mean? Come, search us, and who- 
ever has done this, let him die, and the rest of us will be your lord's bondsmen." 

The overseer begins with Reuben's sack, and, searching each in turn, finds 
nothing in ten of them. The brothers exclaiming, at each failure, " Did not we 
tell you? What a shame to suspect us of such wickedness!" But their faces 
grow white, and their eyes fixed, as the boy Benjamin's sack is opened, and the 
cup. lifted out. 



142 r EST ED AND FORGIVEN. 

You sec, Joseph wants to find out if the brothers, who had treated him so 
wickedly, would desert his little brother in any trouble. But they stand the test 
well. When they are brought again to Joseph, Judah speaks, for it is he who 
had taken speeial charge of the lad. Read his speech (Genesis xliv. 18), and you 
will not wonder that Joseph "could not refrain himself;" but, making all his 
courtiers and officers leave the hall, made himself known to his brethren. 

" I am Joseph ! " he cries, and in his excitement asks again, " Does my father 
live?" But there is no answer. The guilty men start back in fear, while Benja- 
min cannot believe that Joseph has risen from the dead. But, after a little, the 
lad gains courage, and comes near. The wonderful story draws him to the 
kindly, beautiful man; "and then Joseph fell upon his brother Benjamin's neck 
and wept, and Benjamin wept upon his neck," and soon afterwards all were weep- 
ing and talking together. 

Pharaoh was soon told that Joseph had found his own people, and, princely 
in his gifts and hospitality, he invited the whole tribe to live in Egypt in the 
" land of Goshen." They started once more, with wagons, and asses, and camels, 
" laden with good things ; " and when Israel saw the wagon which Joseph had sent 
to carry him, the spirit of Jacob their father revived ; and Israel said : " It is 
enough — Joseph my son is yet alive; I will go and see him before I die." 







FROM A PALACE TO A WILDERNESS. 

EXODUS I., II., III., and IV. 

For four hundred years the descendants of Israel — the Hebrews, as they called 
themselves — lived in Goshen, which is in the north-east corner of Egypt; that part 
which lies nearest to Palestine. They gradually gave up their tent life, and the 
care of flocks, learning agriculture and the various trades and arts of Egypt. For 
we find them skilled in weaving, engraving on precious stones, reading, writing, 
etc., and only the tribes of Reuben, Manasseh, and Gad were shepherds after 
their return to Palestine. 

The Pharaoh that invited the Hebrews to live in Egypt was one of those 
shepherd kings who conquered the Egyptians, and reigned over them for five hun- 
dred years. Every king in Egypt was called Pharaoh (Child of the Sun) ; but 
the different dynasties were called by different names, just as in England we speak 
of the reign of the Plantagenets, the Stuarts, etc. The shepherd kings of Egypt 
were called the Hyksos. They would naturally have friendly feelings toward a 
tribe of shepherds such as the Hebrews ; and, as long as the Hyksos remained 
on the throne, the Hebrews were probably treated as well as the Egyptians. But 
the common people in Egypt led a miserable, hard life. Indeed, there were really 
no "people" in Egypt — only slaves. 

At length the Egyptians rebelled against the Hyksos, and restored the native 
line of Pharaohs. It may be the Hebrews had fought for the Hyksos; at any rate 
they were oppressed and enslaved by the new kings. These kings were great war- 
riors, and probably many of the fighting men of the Hebrews served in their armies; 
but after a time a Pharaoh — Ramses II. — was seated on the throne, who cared 
more for raising great buildings, and wonderful statues of himself sixty-five feet 
high, than for foreign conquest. He founded towns, dug canals, and filled the land 
with colossi (large statues), sphinxes, and other wonders. Thirty thousand men 
died in this very century in digging out the Mahmoudieh Canal with their hands, 



I44 FROM A PALACE TO A WILDERNESS. 

without picks or spades or wheelbarrows — falling, worn. out with the toil exacted 
from them, by the blows of the taskmasters. Saddest of all, through these lour 
hundred years, the Israelites had almost forgotten the name of the true God. 
Many of them had learned to worship the gods of the Egyptians, under the dif- 
ferent forms of the bull, the goat, the eat, the crocodile, etc. But the very hard- 
ships of their life led them at last to turn and cry out unto the God of Abraham. 

Ramses II. was but a boy when his father, Seti I., alarmed at the way the 
Hebrews were increasing, made a law that every boy baby of that race should be 
drowned. It is not likely that that law was very rigidly enforced after Seti moved 
away from Tanis, the capital of Goshen ; but, while it was in full power, Amram, 
the "kindred of the lofty one," and Jochebed, "she whose glor) is Jehovah," had 
a little son born. These people were of the tribe of Levi, which from the first 
learned all they could of the arts and sciences of the Egyptians. They had already 
two children, Miriam, a girl of twelve, and Aaron, who was three years old. The 
mother hid her baby from the Egyptians for three months; but then, as their 
enemies had learned of the birth of the little one, she had either to let him be 
put to death by the police, or trust him to the God to whom she prayed. So she 
took a large basket, and, lining" and covering it with pitch to make it waterproof, 
laid her baby in the little ark and carried it down to one of the broad canals of 
Tanis, where it floated among' the papyrus reeds. She dared not linger near; but 
Miriam would not be suspected, so she was left to watch. Thermouthis, a sister 
of Seti I. (daughter of the last Pharaoh), coming to the stream with her maids, 
to bathe, noticed the little ark, and, touched by the baby's beauty, determined to 
adopt him. She looked round for a nurse, and quick-witted little Miriam brought 
her mother to care for the boy, whom the princess named Moses, from Mo (water) 
and I rses (the saved on 

Up to forty years of age Moses lived in the palace, or in one of the great tem- 
ple-schools where the boys of the wealthy were educated by the priests. Professor 
ikie thus describes the palace where Moses lived so long. "The palace was 
more like a little town than a house. It stood near the Nile, amidst surrounding 
Lrdens. ()n each side of a large structure which contained the state rooms -\nd 
banqueting hall, were three rows of pavilions of different sizes. These wire con- 
ne< ted with each other by colonnades, or by little bridges, under which flowed canals 
that watered the garden, and made the palace look like a town upon islands. The 




MOSES IN THE BULRUSHES. 



I4fi FROM A PALACE TO A WILDERNESS. 

principal part of the palace was built of light, Nile-mud bricks, and elegantly 
carved woodwork. The walls and pillars, the galleries and colonnades, and even 
the roofs, blazed with many colors, and at every gate rose tall masts, from which 
red and blue flags streamed when the king was 'in residen The rooms were 

high and airy, and the furniture consisted of costly but simple necessaries." The 
gardens below the windows were as wonderful as all else; they formed a carpet 
on which the palace seemed to stand. 

How earl)' in Moses' life he knew of his true birth we are not told. The 
Bible only says, " And when he was full forty years old, it came into his heart to 
visit his brethren, the children of Israel ; " but probably, for many years, he had 
been watching his own people, and felt that he ought to join them. At last, one 
day, seeing a Hebrew suffering from the cruelty of an Egyptian, he interfered, and 
killed the oppressor. No one saw the deed except the Hebrew whom Moses had 
befriended, and he "supposed his brethren would have understood how that God 
by his hand would deliver them ; but they understood not." Moses, thinking the 
Hebrews regarded him as their friend, tried on the next day to make peace be- 
tween two who were quarrelling. But, to his astonishment, one of them turned on 
him and said, "Wilt thou kill me, as thou didst the Egyptian yesterday?" 

Try to realize what a disappointment Moses suffered. He had given up all 
the treasures of Egypt, " choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of 
God," and now these people turned him off, ami he had to run away to escape 
being imprisoned or executed ! He escaped to the peninsula of Sinai. In the 
southern part of this peninsula the Kenites lived, a tribe descended from Abraham 
through Keturah, his second wife. It was a long and painful journey from Egypt 
to the well to which the daughters of Jethro-Raguel had brought his flocks to 
drink. But, though tired, Moses was too courteous to stand by and see the rough 
shepherds pushing the girls aside. He helped water Jethro's flocks, and the lather, 
when he heard of his kindness, invited him into his tent. The daughters thought 

es an Egyptian, but no doubt he told Jethro his story; and together they talked 
of that promise which had been given to Abraham and handed down by a few 
faithful ones through all the generations. "For all the land which thou seest, to 
thee will I give it, and to thy seed forever." 

Hut Jethro, like Abraham, lived in a tent, and his riches were flocks and herds. 
M i . to live with him, kept the flock. lb' married Jethro's daughter, Xipporah, 



FROM A PALACE TO A WILDERNESS. I47 

and lived for forty years in the wilderness. He had been trained for forty years 
in worldly wisdom, and then he was sent out to live a rough, hard life among 
simple folk. Do not you think he must often have felt discouraged, and as if his 
life were "all a mistake?" But we, who know the whole story, can see how this 
life in the wilderness prepared him to- be the leader of his people. He was up 
among the mountains, and that always leads an earnest mind to "feel after God." 
His wandering's with his flocks would make him acquainted with every valley, 
plain, and mountain of the whole region ; with every spring and well, and with 
all the resources of the wilderness. This education would fit him to guide his 
race to the safe shelter where they were to wander so long. 

The Bible tells us the story of the deliverance of the Hebrews, as God knew 
it — not as man saw it. So, though we know from the Word of God that he was 
thinking of his people, and preparing Moses for the work; at the time, the people, 
no doubt, realized very little of all this. We know that several times they tried 
to recover their independence ; they had leading men among themselves, who kept 
them all alert and watchful. Aaron was one of these men, and no doubt he had 
often sent word to his exiled brother as to the state of things in Egypt. Then 
suddenly God revealed himself to Moses. The Voice, that had not been heard for 
four hundred years, spoke, as Moses, seeing a bush all aflame, yet not burned, 
came closer to examine it. " I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, 
the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." And then Moses was instructed for his 
great work. He was not told to prepare his people for war; all was to be done 
by God. His shepherd's rod, turned by God into a fiery serpent, and then re- 
stored to him as a rod, was his emblem of office. The Power that had withered 
and then restored his hand, that could burn and yet not destroy the dry bush, 
that power could conquer even Pharaoh. 

"And Moses and Aaron went and gathered together all the elders of the 
children of Israel : and Aaron spake all the words which the Lord had spoken 
unto Moses, and did the signs in the sight of the people. And the people be- 
lieved : and when they heard that the Lord had visited the children of Israel, 
and that he had looked upon their affliction, then they bowed their heads and 
worshipped." 



DELIVERED FROM BONDAGE. 

EXODUS XIII. and XIV. 

Ramses II. was dead, and Menephtah I., one of his sons, had succeeded him. 
The Hebrews, longing once more to worship the God of their fathers, desired to 
offer sacrifices to him. This, if done in Goshen, would have roused the utmost 
fury of the Egyptians, for bullocks and rams were sacred with them, and wor- 
shipped as gods. If such sacrifices were to be offered at all, the Hebrews must 
be allowed to go outside the kingdom — "three days' journey into the desert." But 
this moderate request, which Moses made for his people, was refused. 

The story of the plagues which God sent upon the Egyptians by the hand 
of Moses can be read in the Book of Exodus, beginning at the seventh chapter. 
Remember, as you read of these plagues, that the Nile was not like any ordinary 
river ; it was the only river of that great country, and was worshipped as a god ; 
guided into canals and tanks, it nourished the land, making the " desert blossom 
as the rose." The frog, too, was embalmed and honored by the Egyptians. The 
third plague was a kind of " tick," which lives in hot sand and dust, and buries 
itself in the flesh of men and animals, feeding on their blood. The plague of 
flies included the beetle, which was a most sacred symbol of the Egyptian religion. 
The fifth plague — a disease which attacked the cattle — was almost as bad as the 
tenth, for the Egyptians worshipped the sacred bull, and the calf. The plague of 
boils, some have thought, was leprosy. 

It seems as if Pharaoh could not have resisted, when visited by such plagues; 
but we must remember that we see the hand of God more plainly than he did. 
It was so easy to say: "This is, after all, only a natural event — it may never 
happen again," for each plague was one of the ordinary troubles of the country, 
increased. Then, again, the Hebrews were a great nation o( slaves, ami to have 
to part with them would be a terrible loss — Pharaoh would not give up. So hail 
followed, and locusts, then the sun — the god of all gods in Egypt — was hidden; 



i 5 o DELIVERED FROM BONDAGE. 

everywhere but in the land of the Hebrews a darkness settled down for three 
days. And Pharaoh said: "Go ye, serve the Lord; only let your flocks and your 
herds be stayed: let your little ones also go with you. And Moses said, .... 
Our cattle also shall go with us; there shall not an hoof be left behind." 

This was more than Pharaoh would grant; and he said angrily, that if Moses 
dared show himself again, he should die. "And Moses said, Thou hast spoken 
well, I will see thy face again no more." 

Then there was great preparation among the Hebrews. The elders told them 
that God's angel was to pass through the land of Egypt that night, to smite all 
the first-born ; but wherever he saw the mark of a lamb's blood on the lintel 
and side-posts of the door, he would not enter to kill. How anxiously the eldest 
child must have watched the killing of the Passover lamb. He did not rest, you 
may be sure, till he saw the marks clearly made upon the door; then, instead of 
lying down to sleep, all were prepared for a long journey. Some were rich, but 
the most were very poor. But God gave them favor with their neighbors, and 
when they asked for dresses and ornaments the Egyptians gave them all they 
needed. Then, when at midnight a great cry arose from the Egyptians, begging 
the Israelites to leave the land in haste, as in every Egyptian house one child lax- 
dead, each Hebrew father hurried, by the light of the full April moon, with his 
wife and children to the appointed meeting-place; his little ones and the sick in the 
panniers of asses; his cattle driven before him; the unbaked bread, in the family 
kneading-trough, wrapped up in his sheepskin on his shoulder. 

Gathering in different cities and villages throughout Egypt, they all met at 
Tanis, where Moses led them out. The crowd was not all Hebrew; among them 
were prisoners of war, shepherd tribes of Goshen, and multitudes of slaves. "And 
tin Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud, to lead them the way; 
and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night." At 
first all went well. The very sight of their own numbers gave them courage. 
The)- had still fresh water, and plenty of fodder lor their cattle. But .soon murmurs 
were heard; they dreaded a battle with the soldiers stationed on the frontier, and 
M<>>es, to escape any dangers of battle, led them to the shores of the Red Sea. 

\ -en as the seventy days of mourning for the dead were over, Pharaoh 
began to regret having let the children of Israel go. He saw that they meant to 
stay, for they had taken their sick, and all their possessions; and, hearing that 



DELIVERED FROM BONDAGE. 151 

they were " lost in the wilderness," he ordered out his army of chariots and 
soldiers, and started in hot pursuit. What had been a slow and toilsome march 
for the Hebrews, was a short journey for the chariots and their drivers. The 
Hebrews, who had just broken camp, and were marching toward the sea, saw by 
the cloud of dust that they were pursued. In their terror, the Hebrews taunted 
Moses with bringing them out to die. But he answered so calmly that even the 
children hushed their cries : " Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of 
the Lord, which he will show to you to-day: for the Egyptians, whom ye have 
seen to-day, ye shall see them again no more forever. The Lord shall fight for 
you, and ye shall hold your peace." 

And most gloriously, as you know, did God fight for his people. Read the 
song that Moses and the great multitude sang, as they stood on the other side 
— saved from their enemies. 

We cannot follow the Israelites through all their wanderings; but would notice 
particularly the mountain before which they assembled to receive the law from God 
himself. Here, on a deep, wide, yellow plain, the people, in their fear and awe, 
" removed and stood afar off." The mountain, rising like a great altar, in front 
of the whole congregation, and visible against the sky in lonely grandeur, from 
end to end of the whole plain, is the very image of the " mount that might be 
touched," and from which the voice of God might be heard, far and wide over 
the stillness of the plain below. Here it was that God spoke the Commandments 
which he afterward wrote on two tables of stone. The people answered with one 
voice, "All the words which the Lord hath said, we will do." 

Moses then disappeared from the people. They saw him go up into the 
mount of the Lord ; but, day after day, he did not return. Helpless, and lost, 
without a leader, they demanded that Aaron should make a god for them like 
those they had known in Egypt; to be, in their eyes, the God who had brought 
them out from that land, and to go before them, instead of Moses. Aaron yielded, 
and announced a "feast to the Lord" — with the calf, made of their jewels, to wor- 
ship ! Moses, taught of God as to the making of the tabernacle, knew nothing of 
the sin his people were committing, until God said : " Go, get thee down ; for thy 
people, which thou broughtest out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves." 

Moses, as he saw the people worshipping the calf, threw the tables of the 
law down, and ordered the idol to be ground to powder, and thrown into the 



152 DELIVERED FROM BONDAGE. 

water. Then, calling - for all who were on the side of Jehovah, he was joined by 
the tribe of Levi, who were told to gird on their swords, and, passing' through 
the host, put down the rebellion at any cost. Before night all were penitent, but 
three thousand men lay dead. Another punishment followed, for Moses' tent was 
removed outside the camp, where the cloudy, fiery pillar was seen above it. The 
people, penitent and humbled, worshipped, standing" in the doors of their tents. 

Again, for forty days, Moses stayed in the mount; but the people stood the 
test this time, and he brought back two new tables of the law. Then they set 
about making the tabernacle, which God had shewed Moses in the mount. This 
was a beautiful movable tent-temple, divided into two rooms by a curtain. In the 
outer room, or the Holy Place, was the Table of Shewbread, the Altar of Incense, 
and the Golden Candlestick ; while in the Holy of Holies was the Sacred Ark. 
This ark was made of acacia wood, overlaid within and without with pure gold. 
Over it was a golden covering, known as the Mercy-seat, with two golden cheru- 
bim with outspread wings bending toward the centre. The movement of the 
mysterious cloud which rested on the tabernacle was the signal for striking or 
pitching the camp. When it was " taken up from off it," the advance was sounded 
on silver trumpets by the Levites, Moses repeating the words: "Rise up, O Lord, 
and let thine enemies be scattered; and let them that hate thee flee before thee," 
the whole host re-echoing them far and near. In the same way the descent of 
the cloud was the sign to halt; and then, as the ark was once more solemnly 
laid down, the prayer, caught up from the lips of Moses, and intoned by the whole 
camp, rose up to heaven : " Return, O Lord, unto the many thousands of Israel." 

The illustration given with this chapter refers to an event that happened three 
or four hundred years later than the time of the Exodus. The children of Israel 
had been defeated in battle by the Philistines, and though they had been forbidden 
to take the ark out of the tabernacle, they carried it into the next battle, where it was 
captured by the Philistines. Great was the mourning among the Israelites, and great 
the joy among their enemies. Hut the Philistines found that the ark was no bless- 
ing to them; — wherever they took it, sickness broke out. At last, to see if it 
ally was the ark that was the cause of their trouble, they put it on a new cart, 
ami yoked two cows to it, whose calves had just been taken from them, letting 
them go where they would. Instead of turning toward their calves, the cows 
"went along the highway, lowing as they went, to Beth-she-mesh." 



THE HOLY CITY. 

i CHRONICLES XVI. 

" Jerusalem, Jerusalem, 

Chief in thy Prince's diadem ! 

Famous in story, and in song, 

While countless ages rolled along ; 

Of mighty name, of lofty line, 

Prophets and priests and kings were thine ; 

In dust thou long hast cradled them ; 

Their boast, their home, Jerusalem." — H. W. J. 

David did not succeed Saul at once as king of Israel ; for seven years and 
a half he reigned over the tribe of Judah only, and Ishbosheth, Saul's only living 
son, reigned as king over the other tribes. But Ishbosheth was a very weak, in- 
capable king, and had not been appointed by God. The people were gradually 
learning to wish for David ; and at last, Ishbosheth having been assassinated by 
two of his enemies, David was chosen king by all Israel, and anointed again 
amidst great rejoicings. He was thirty-eight years old when, after years of trial, 
he became ruler of the nation. His first act was to try to buy Jebus from the 
band of Canaanites who had held it for centuries. But the Jebusites refused to 
sell the city, and boasted that the place was so strong — built on twin hills, and 
cut off by deep valleys from the country round — that the lame and blind could 
keep the Israelites out. David immediately issued a proclamation, promising a 
great reward to the general who conquered the city; and a storming part}-, under 
Joab, clambered up the precipices and gained possession. The Jebusites were 
allowed to remain on the eastern hill, Mount Moriah; while Zion, the western hill, 
became the city of David, Jerusalem — " the Place of Peace." The whole nation 
learned to love this city; and even now, in every synagogue over the world, 
prayers still go up to God, asking that Jehovah will in mercy return to Jerusalem. 



i 54 THE HOL V CITY. 

A beautiful palace, worthy of a king, was begun at once on Mount Zion, 
Hiram, king of Tyre, sending workmen and cedars for the building. The Philis- 
tines soon attacked the king; but, shutting himself within his fortified city, he 
waited till his enemies were under its very walls, in the "Valley of Giants," and 
then attacked them so furiously that they fled to the sea-plains in confusion, 
leaving their idols on the field. 

Again the Philistines made a second attempt, by the same pass, but the 
Israelites crept around them and stole upon them, through a wood of mulberry 
trees. David and his host firmly believed that the murmur of the leaves was the 
footfall of Jehovah marching before them, to smite their enemies; with such faith 
the victory was easy, and the Philistines were, before long, so far subdued that 
David exacted tribute from them. 

But the king's principal desire in choosing Jerusalem as his city was to make 
it a Holy City; and, to do this, he longed to bring the ark — that ark which had 
been neglected all through Saul's reign — to Jerusalem. Having prepared a beauti- 
ful tabernacle (the old tabernacle still remained at Gibeon), he summoned all the 
tribes to attend the removal of the ark from Kirjath-jearim. All Israel talked of 
the great event: "We heard men say at Ephratah," in the south of the land, 
"and we found them repeat it in the woody Lebanon: Let us go into His taber- 
nacle, let us worship at His footstool." The king could not rest till he had found 
a habitation for the God of Jacob. Men came to the festival from even two 
hundred and fifty miles away. 

The ark was placed on a new cart, drawn by oxen, which showed how the 
people had forgotten the law of Moses: that law required that the ark should be 
carried by its poles, by consecrated Levites. The ark left the house of Abinadab, 
on the hill of Kirjath-jearim, one of his sons, Uzzah, going beside it, and the 
other, Ahio, going in front. As it moved down the hill the gre.U multitude 
joined in the procession; bands of singers sang David's psalm-, with musicians 
playing on large and small harps, tambourines, castanets, clarions, and cymbals, 
I I avid, the king, leading them all. Hut, passing a .spot known a- tin' threshing- 
floor of Nachon, tin: oxen stumbled, and l'/xah, afraid the ark would fall, took 
hold of it. He sank dead at its side— struck, it is thought, by lightning. David 
and the people were so dismayed at this that the ark was left in the house of 
a Levite, Obed-edom 




DAVID MOURNING OVER ABSALOM. 



! 5 6 THE HOLY CITY. 

Three months passed by; and again David resolved to bring the ark to 
Jerusalem. But this time every rule was observed; the ark was carried on its 
staves by Levites, and none but they were permitted to come near it. The chief 
men of all Israel were summoned, and nearly one thousand of the most eminent 
priests and Levites, with the flower of the army and its most famous leaders, 
were appointed to take part in the procession. The sacred relic, borne on the 
shoulders of chosen men, at last moved forward, amidst the shouts of assembled 
thousands repeating the chants of the wilderness life — nearly five hundred years 
before — "Let God arise, and let his enemies be scattered." "Arise, O Lord, into 
thy rest: thou, and the ark of thy strength." After advancing six paces, a pause 
was made while bullocks and rams were sacrificed. Then the vast procession once 
more moved on, amidst loud flourishes of trumpets, blown by mighty warriors, 
and the anthems of the choirs. The two high-priests — Zadok from Gibeon, and 
Abiathar from the palace of David — followed in their gorgeous robes ; and behind 
them came long companies of turbaned priests and Levites in spotless white; 
next came the great captains; next the dignitaries of the land, the princes of 
Judah and Benjamin, and those of Zebulon and Naphtali. 

The ark advanced like the chariot of a great conqueror, ascending the sacred 
hill in triumph to Jerusalem. The long-drawn peal of the trumpets echoed among 
the hills around; the shout, as of a victorious host, rang through the valleys; 
the entrance of the ark into the gates appeared almost like the entrance of 
Jehovah himself. The procession approached the ramparts amidst chants of priests 
and Levites, proclaiming the glory of Him who was drawing nigh, and the purity 
required from all who ascend into his holy hill; then, as if addressing the warders 
on the walls, a chorus demanded that the gates be thrown open: 

" Lift up your heads, O ye 

Be ye lift up, ye ancient door-; ; 

That the King of Glory may enter in." 

But the warders, hesitating, answered with responding chant: 

"Who is this King of Glory?" 

Thm came, in triumphant chords, the reply: 

"Jehovah, strong and mighty; 
Jehovah, mighty in battli 



THE HOLY CITY. 157 

Then, as the gates were thrown wide, both choirs united in a grand chorus, 
singing as the procession swept through: 

" Lift up your heads, O ye gates, 
Lift them up, ye ancient doors : 
And the King of Glory shall come in. 
Who is this King of Glory ? 
Jehovah of Hosts ; 
He is the King of Glory." 

Renewed sacrifices were offered as the ark entered the tent prepared for it, 
and a magnificent psalm sung (1 Chron. xvi. 8-36), composed by David for the 
occasion. David then dismissed the multitude with his benediction, and the day 
closed with great festivities. 

Many wars took place with the enemies of Israel during David's reign, but 
the saddest of all was the civil war, brought about by his son Absalom. The 
story of this war will be given in the next chapter. The picture here given 
represents David as he wept for Absalom. He forgot his son's disobedience and 
deceit the moment he was dead, and could only sob: "O my son Absalom! my 
son, my son Absalom ! Would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, 
my son ! " 




A REBELLIOUS SON. 

2 SAMUEL XVIII. 

We must not forget, in reading the Bible, that the Old Testament heroes 
lived in very different times from ours. What we regard as wicked and coarse, 
was then thought necessary and right. For instance, David, a man after (iod's 
own heart, was still so much a man after the pattern of his age that he showed 
no mercy to prisoners of war. " He sawed them with saws ; cut them with iron 
cutting-instruments," etc. It was not till Christ came that even believers in God 
learned to be merciful to their enemies. So, too, David had many wives, and 
did not see any wrong in it; but these marriages brought him much trouble, for 
the children of the different wives were constantly quarrelling. Absalom, the sec- 
ond son, killed his elder brother, Amnon ; and, though David punished him by 
exile, he was at last forgiven and allowed to return to Jerusalem. 

Absalom was not at all like his father, except in his beauty; he was mean 
and selfish; but "in all Israel there was' none to be praised for his beauty like 
him." His hair was so admired that what was cut each \ ear was weighed. 

Shortly after Absalom had been allowed to return to Jerusalem, David ordered 
a census to be taken of the people, to see how main' he could call to arms. 
This was known to be an act that God did not approve, and was hateful to all 
the nation; but David insisted on it, and, after ten months, the census was nearly 
complete, when the Lord sent Gad, a prophet, to tell David that he might choose 
one of three punishments for his sin : three years of famine, three months' flight 
before invaders, or three days of pestilence — which would he choose? David peni- 
tently gave answer: "Let us now fall into the hands o\ Jehovah, for his mercies 
are great, and let US not fall into tin: hands of man." So the plague followed. 
In three: days seventy thousand persons died, and an angel was seen on the top 
<>f Mount Moriah, the hill just outside of Jerusalem, his hand stretched out to 
destroy the city. In answer to David's prayer, before Jerusalem was struck the 




THE DEATH OF ABSALOM. 



160 A REBELLIOUS SON. 

plague was stayed, and in memory of this mercy the spot on Mount Moriah was 
consecrated, and there, in Solomon's time, the temple was erected. 

But the nation was estranged from David by the census, and Absalom made 
the most of the feeling. Whispers sprang up here and there about a new and 
younger king. They had done well in taking David for Saul — why not now take 
Absalom for David ? The tribe of Judah had never liked David removing the 
capital from Hebron to Jerusalem. The great tribe of Ephraim, too, did not feel 
content since the king was of Judah. Absalom dazzled the people by his beauty 
and royal state. David had been content to ride on a mule ; but Absalom 
had horses and chariots, with running footmen. On the other hand, all bowed 
low to the king; but Absalom pretended to be more friendly, and would embrace 
and kiss the people. It was the custom of the king to sit in the gate on certain 
days, and hear all appeals that were made to him; but it was natural that some 
were overlooked or delayed, and those who were decided against were vexed. 
Absalom met all such with hints that if he were judge — if he had power, things 
would be different! And so he gradually won the hearts of the people, till, under 
the pretence of having made a vow to offer sacrifices on Hebron, he went with a 
train of two hundred of the best citizens of Jerusalem to Hebron. Ahitophel, who 
had been David's friend and best counsellor, was won over, and went with Absa- 
lom. Messengers were sent all over the country with the word that, at the sound 
of signal trumpets, Absalom was to be proclaimed king; and at last, at the feast 
in Hebron, the signal trumpets were sounded, and the air rang with shouts of, 
"God save king; Absalom." 

Word was soon brought to David of the rebellion, and that numbers from 
all the tribes were hastening to Hebron to do homage to Absalom. That his 
dearly loved son, and his people, even his own people of Judah, should seek his 
life, almost broke the king's heart; but in all his sorrow he thought of his beloved 
city, and, unwilling to risk its destruction, he left it at once. Followed by all his 
household, David set out. walking barefoot, as a sign of humiliation and mourn- 
ing. Crowds of the citizens went with him; and his faithful six hundred followers, 
the Gibborim, a- his old companions in the cave were called, marched as his 
• irt. The whole population were moved to see a king who had made his peo- 
ple so illustrious one who had been a hero from his youth — now, at sixty years 
of age, driven from his throne by his son. Zadok and Abiathar, the two high- 



A REBELLIOUS SON. 161 

priests, had hurried from Jerusalem with the ark, but David, who soon regained 
his firm trust in God, sent them back with the ark to the tabernacle. The priests, 
too, could send him word of how matters went if they remained in the city. A 
little further on Ilushai, an old friend and companion of David's, joined him, but 
he was sent back to Jerusalem to defeat, if possible, the counsel of Ahitophel. 

So, slowly and sadly, David and his company went on to the open plain at 
the fords of Jordan, where they waited to hear from Hushai. 

Absalom entered Jerusalem in triumph very soon after David had left it. 
Ahitophel rode by his side, ready with wise counsel ; and among the first to greet 
the new king was Hushai — even Absalom was shocked at his supposed treachery. 
A council was held at the palace, and Ahitophel urged Absalom to let him lead 
twelve thousand men at once against David, who, weak and disheartened, would 
be easily conquered ; the people with him would run away, and only the king's 
blood need be shed. All approved of this — all but Hushai. He said that David 
and his Gibborim were fierce as a bear robbed of her cubs, and that the king 
was too good a warrior to be surprised. He advised Absalom to call out all 
Israel from Dan to Beersheba, and that he (Absalom) should head them in per- 
son. Absalom thought Hushai's counsel the best, and agreed to it, and two sons 
of the priests, quick runners, were at once sent to carry the good news to David. 
For, if Absalom took time to raise an army, David could raise one too! 

Before night David and his people had crossed the Jordan, where the Eastern 
tribes rallied round him. Absalom lost his real counsellor; for Ahitophel, angry 
at Hushai's advice being taken, and sure that the rebellion would not succeed, 
went to his house at Gilo and handed himself. 

Three months went by; David was at Mahanaim, where Saul's son, Ishbosheth, 
had reigned for seven years. It was during this time of waiting that David wrote 
the forty-first, fifty-fifth, sixty-fifth, and one hundred and ninth psalms, referring to 
Ahitophel, his "own familiar friend, whom he had trusted, and who ate of his 
bread," but had now " lifted up his heel " against him ; and to this time are 
attributed the third, fourth, and twenty-third psalms. 

At last the battle that was to crush the rebellion was fought in the Wood 
of Ephraim. "The Light of Israel," as David was fondly called by his people, 
could not be risked in the battle, and he waited within the city walls with a 
reserve corps, to succor the rest if necessary. As the troops marched to battle, 



A REBELLIOUS SOX 

one command was repeated again and again — "Absalom was to be spared and 
treated gently if he should fall into their hands." 

Absalom's army was much the larger of the two, and the hand-to-hand 
struggle was very blood}-. But the victory was with the king. Twenty thousand 
of the prince's forces lay dead, and the rest fled in panic. The pursuit through 
the thickets and marshes of the woods was terrible for the fugitives. Absalom 
himself, hurrying through the tangled paths of the forest, was caught by his long 
l)air in a branch of a great oak tree and held fast, while his mule went on, leav- 
ing him hanging in the air. Joab, hearing of his plight, hastened to the spot, 
and caring nothing for David's command — for lie knew it was a weak and foolish 
one — he thrust three javelins in the prince and killed him. A trumpet-call to stop 
pursuing the fugitives then sounded; Absalom's dead bod}' was flung into a hole 
in the ground, and every one passing flung stones on it as a sign of bitter anger 
at so undutiful a son. Absalom had raised a pillar in his own honor in the 
"King's Vale," about a quarter of a mile from Jerusalem; but his wickedness left 
him a grave marked only by the heap of stones, to which passers-by added for 
a Ion 1 '" time afterward. 

O 

The news of the death of his son made David for a time forget all else; but, 
roused at last by Joab's remonstrances, he took his seat in the gate and rewarded 
his soldiers by words of praise. 

I )avid, the hearts of the nation once more his, returned to Jerusalem, where 
he busied himself in making every preparation that he could for the great temple 
which Solomon, his young son, was to build. Before his death, to make Mire 
of Solomon's Miccession, that prince was solemnly anointed and proclaimed king, 
and even a second time, when the tribes had sent their elders and chiefs to 
Jerusalem, Solomon was again anointed, and warned that all his glory and safety 
depended on his living a godly life. At last, at seventy years of age, having 
reigned nearly forty years, David died, and was buried in the "City of David." 
Only the kings were allowed burial within the city walls; and probably beneath 
the heap of ruins that bury the ancient Jerusalem the allies oi David still rest in 
their rock-hewn sepulchre. 



THE COURAGEOUS QUEEN. 

BOOK OF ESTHER. 

One of the favorite books of the Bible is the Book of Esther. Its heroine 
was an orphan Jewess, who had been adopted by her childless uncle, Mordecai. 
She was a very beautiful girl, and probably not particularly Jewish-looking, as the 
king did not know she belonged to that people till some years after he had 
chosen her for his queen. Ahasuerus is thought to have been the Persian king 
Xerxes. The kings in his time had given up residing at Babylon, except in the 
very coldest seasons, and spent most of the year at Susa or Shushan. Here a 
beautiful palace had been built; and in this palace, at a great feast which Ahas- 
uerus gave to his nobles, the queen, Vashti, was commanded to unveil her face, 
that all might see her beauty. It seems a little thing to us for the king to ask ; 
but in Vashti's eyes it was a most insulting command, lowering her as we should 
feel lowered if we were commanded to appear in public without any outer dress 
on. The queen, very properly, refused, and the anxiety of the king and counsel- 
lors that other women should not learn from Vashti to refuse obedience to their 
husbands is quite amusing. "For if this deed," they said, "shall come abroad, 
we'll all be having trouble with our wives! we must request you to rule the 
queen, that we may rule our lesser queens ! " So poor Vashti was dismissed, 
very thankful, no doubt, that her head was spared. 

It was then proposed to get together all the beautiful girls that could be 
found, so that the king might choose a queen. Esther, by her quiet, modest 
ways, won the friendship of Hegai, the chamberlain in charge of these young 
girls, and, indeed, the good-will of all in the palace, so there was general re- 
joicing when the king chose her as his queen. Mordecai had forbidden her to 
mention her kindred or people; and, though her uncle was employed in the 
palace, the people did not know that the beautiful young queen was his niece. 

Going in and out of the palace, summoned to the king's councils, honored 



1 64 THE COURAGEOUS QUE EX. 

as his friend, was a man named Haman. Every one bowed down before him — 
every one tried to win his favor — for he had many opportunities to advance their 
interests. But there was just one man that did not flatter him or fawn upon him; 
one man who refused to bow down before him. Mordecai, the Jew, showed by 
his manner that he saw through this Haman, whom all were honoring. The more 
firmly Mordecai refused to honor Hainan, the more important did the matter be- 
come in the eyes of the king's favorite. 

Mordeeai discovered a plot to assassinate the king, and, giving timely warn- 
ing of it, the king's life was saved. How Haman trembled lest notice should be 
taken of the Jew's loyalty ! But the days went by, and the only notice taken of 
Mordecai's service was a register of what he had done in the chronicles of the 
realm. Haman grew more and more prosperous, and more and more angry at 
the one man who refused to do him honor. lie hated Mordecai so that he at 
last resolved to kill, not him alone, but all the Jews throughout the kingdom. 
These Jews were comparatively little known to Ahasuerus ; so, when Haman de- 
scribed them as "a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the peo- 
ple in all the provinces of thy kingdom; and their laws are diverse from all 
people ; neither keep they the king's laws ; therefore it is not for the king's profit 
to suffer them," and offered to pay two million dollars himself to hire soldiers to 
destroy them, the king thought Haman a very loyal subject, and even gave him 
the royal signet ring to sign a decree for the wholesale massacre of the Jews 
throughout the kingdom. Haman, who was superstitious, like all heathen, had 
east lots to see what month would be propitious for this massacre, and the lot 
fell on the next to the last month of the year; so there were seven months in 
which some way of escape might be found. 

Great was the dismay among the Jews on hearing of the decree, which was 
published at once in Shushan, while "posts" — men on horses over the plains, on 
mules in the hilly countries, and on camels or dromedaries on the hot, arid up- 
lands — carried the decree to the farthest part of the realm. Mordecai no longer 
sat in the king's gate; for he laid aside his court-dress, and, clad in sackcloth, 
cried out to God. Esther, hearing that her uncle sat in sackcloth, sent presents 
of clothing to him, begging him to be cheerful, for at first the young queen did 
not know of the decree ; but Mordecai sent a copy of it to his niece, charging 
her that she should go in unto the king and intercede in behalf of her people. 




ESTHER CONFOUNDING HAMAN. 



THE COURAGEOUS QUEEN. 



;ther, queen as she is, does not question that she should still obey the good, 
kind man who has been as a father to her; but she thinks Mordecai cannot 
-lize what a risk she will run, and how little she actually sees of the king. 
"All the king's servants," she sends word to Mordecai, "and the people of the 
king's provinces, do know, that whosoever, whether man or woman, shall come 
unto the king into the inner court, who is not called, there is one law of his to 
put him to death, except such to whom the king shall hold out the golden 
sceptre, that he may live : but I have not been called to come in unto the king 
the^e thirty days." 

But Mordecai cannot see his whole nation perish without risking something to 
save them ; even his darling Esther had better die than not try to save her peo- 
ple ; and he sends this message to Esther: "Think not with thyself that thou 
shalt escape in the king's house, more than all the Jews. For if thou altogether 
holdest thy peace at this time, then shall there enlargement and deliverance arise 
to the Jews from another place ; but thou and thy father's house shall be de- 
stroyed : and who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a 
time as this ? " Upon this the queen, sending a request Chat all her people in 
Shushan may fast for her, declares: "I also and my maidens will fast likewise: 
and so will I go in unto the king, which is not according to the law; and if I 
perish, I perish." 

It is not an easy thing to face death. Life, no doubt, was very sweet to 
beautiful Esther; but, strengthened by prayer, on the third day she put on her 
royal apparel and went into the king's presence unbidden. Her fasting and prayer 
had made her face even lovelier than before. Her eyes, filled with holy resolves, 
looked more wondrously beautiful than on the day when the king first loved her; 
and so the golden sceptre is held out, and Esther is safe. With wonderful tact 
she invites the king and his friend Hainan to a banquet, where the king again 
asks what favor she desires, assuring her that he will grant it, even to the 
half of his kingdom; but she begs that he will come again with Hainan to a 
banquet which she will prepare on the next day, when she will make known her 
request. 

That night the king could not sleep, and ordered the record or book of 
chronicles to be brought and read to him. By God's providence they read of 
Mordecai's discovery of the plot against the king's life. Ahasuerus asked what 



THE COURAGEOUS QUEEN. 167 

honor or reward had been given to Mordecai. To his surprise he found nothing 
had been done. Early the next morning, as he was planning what he could do 
for this loyal servant, he heard Haman was in the outer court (who had come 
to ask permission to hang Mordecai !), and sent for him, asking him abruptly 
what he thought should be done for a man whom the king delighted to honor. 
Haman, quite sure he was the man, said : " Let the royal apparel be brought 
which the king useth to wear, and the horse that the king rideth upon, and the 
crown royal which is set upon his head: and let this apparel and horse be de- 
livered to the hand of one of the king's most noble princes, that they may array 
the man withal whom the king delighteth to honor, and bring him on horseback 
through the street of the city, and proclaim before him, Thus shall it be done 
to the man whom the king delighteth to honor." 

Oh, how he could have bitten his own tongue out when Ahasuerus bade him 
do all that for Mordecai ! He dared not refuse; and, after swallowing the bitter 
pill of honoring Mordecai, who had refused to honor him, he had to hurry to the 
queen's banquet. There, before his face, Esther told the king of his horrible 
cruelty ; and that the Jews, whom Haman wished to kill, were her people. In 
vain the wretched man begged for pity; his face was covered — as to this day in 
Persia they cover the face of one who is to be executed — and he was hanged on 
the very gallows he had prepared for Mordecai. But, as we know, Persian de- 
crees were unchangeable ; so all that Ahasuerus could do for his queen's people 
was to send by his swiftest posts another decree that the Jews, on that thirteenth 
day of Adar, might "stand for their life, to destroy, to slay, and to cause to 
perish, all the power that would assault them." Mordecai, too, was raised to 
great power, and issued a decree that all Jews should keep the feast of Purim 
on the fourteenth and fifteenth of the month Adar in commemoration of this 
great deliverance. 




PASSING THROUGH FIRE. 

DANIEL III. 

It was not, after all, the king of Assyria who conquered the people of Judah. 
For one hundred years, through the reigns of bad kings like Manasseh, and good 
ones like Josiah, God saved them from their enemies ; but at last, as they would 
not hearken to the prophets, he allowed Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, to 
conquer them. Twice this king besieged Jerusalem. The first time he carried 
back with him some of the nobles and princes as hostages ; some years after, all 
but the shepherds and farmers were taken captives. These first hostages were 
probably well treated, and the young princes were placed in one of the royal 
palaces and carefully educated in all the learning of the Babylonians. Four of 
these boys were earnest, religious Jews, Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, 
who resolved to serve God in the heathen palace. One of the first temptations 
that they had to meet was a hard one for boys. They felt it their duty to re- 
fuse the dainties and pleasant food offered them. For a Jew, meat which had 
been killed by any but the Levitcs was " unclean," and he was also forbidden to 
eat many kinds of food — such as pork or hares, or meat cooked in butter. So, 
good as the meals were, these four boys felt they must not eat them ; and, to 
make as little trouble as possible, they ate only pulse — a kind of vegetable — and 
drank only water. But the steward, who was put in charge of the boys, was 
afraid he would be blamed if they looked poor and neglected, and so he told 
Daniel that he dared not let them refuse the king's meat. Daniel asked him to 
test them ten days, and then, if they did not improve on the plain fare, they 
would eat the food provided. "And at the end of ten days their countenances 
appeared fairer and fatter in flesh than all the children which did eat the portion 
of the king's meat." 

What sort of a place was this Babylon, in which these boys were trying to 
serve Go How did it look in their eyes, used as they were to Jerusalem, 




THE FIERY FURNACE. 



i;o PASS/XG THROUGH FIRE. 

the city set on a hill, with its narrow streets and deep valleys ? As they came 
within sight of the city, which was built on the banks of the Euphrates, with a 
great flat plain all about it, except on the south, where an arm of the Persian 
Gulf spread out like a small sea, the boys thought they saw great high hills, 
but, to their astonishment, they were told those were the city walls. These walls, 
from forty to sixty miles in circumference, were three hundred feet high, with a 
carriage-road on the top eighty feet wide. They were built of sun-dried bricks, 
and probably covered with paintings which recorded the triumphs of Chaldea. 
Great moats, like rivers, surrounded the walls. The boys saw the tower described 
in the chapter headed " Nimrod and Abraham." Perhaps they stood on its top- 
most story and looked down on the beautiful city, with forests and parks laid 
out in it, with its many-colored buildings, which were three and four stories high, 
and painted so brightly that they looked as if made of porcelain, with bright 
flowers everywhere ; and, over the plain outside the walls, a great sea of culti- 
vated fields. Perhaps they were conducted at once to the palace of the king 
which was itself a city within the city, being seven miles round. They wandered 
through its gardens, which, they were told, had been laid out to please a foreign 
princess whom the king had married, who longed to see hills instead of the flat 
country: so these gardens rose one above another to a height of more than 
seventy feet, and on these hills great forest-trees grew side by side with tender 
flowering shrubs. The boys wondered, no doubt, that they could have thought 
their sacred temple so vast, and saw how r little reason they had to boast of the 
palaces of their kings, which had seemed so magnificent before. The brilliant 
costumes of the numberless court officers — the satraps, captains, chief judges, treas- 
urers, councillors, and rulers of the different provinces — dazzled the young Jews 
as they saw them dashing through the wide streets in golden chariots drawn 1>\ 
magnificent horses. Delightful music on many instruments that they had never 
seen before was heard in the streets and palace 5. 

It was no easy thing to keep simple and pure in the midst of all this. It 
was only by daily prayer — a habit of prayer — that these youths kept faithful to 
the God of their fathers, in the midst o\ an idolatrous court. The king, testing 
them in various ways, found them "ten times better than all the magicians and 
astrologi rs that were in his realm." This shows that they studied faithfully, as 
v. 11 as prayed earnestly. We will follow fust the three young men whose heathen 



PASSING THROUGH FIRE. iji 

names were Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, and reserve Daniel's story for 
another time. It was Daniel, though, that advanced his companions, for it was at 
his request that they were given positions of trust. But their very advancement 
was dangerous to them. 

Nebuchadnezzar, who had conquered the great Assyrian kingdom, as well as 
Phoenicia and smaller kingdoms, determined that he would bind together all these 
different peoples in the worship of one god ; then, too, he felt that the god Bel, 
or Belus, should be honored by all the world. So he had an enormous image 
erected on the great plain of Dura. The image was covered with gold, and 
could be seen from a long distance. All the rulers of every province, from near 
and far, were ordered to attend at the dedication of this image, and when the 
instruments sounded all were to bow and adore. Warning was given that if any 
did not bow down and worship the image they should be cast into the furnace. 
Herodotus tells us that a few centuries before the Christian era there was at 
Babylon an idol image made of gold, eighteen feet high, and that every stranger 
was obliged to worship it before he entered the city. 

We do not know where Daniel was at this time. It may be that Nebuchad- 
nezzar purposely kept him in some other part of the kingdom to save him. But 
his three friends, as "rulers of the province," had to attend the meeting. Were 
they troubled and anxious ? It may be that very morning they strengthened each 
other with the word they had heard from the prophet : " When thou walkest 
through the fire, thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle upon 
thee." At any rate, when Nebuchadnezzar, astonished at their daring, remon- 
strated with them, and warned them of the penalty which must follow disobe- 
dience, they answered calmly : " O Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer 
thee in this matter. If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us 
from the burning fiery furnace ; and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king. 
But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor 
worship the golden image which thou hast set up." 

In a fury at their calmness, the king commanded the furnace to be heated 
seven times as hot as usual ; and so fierce were its fires that the mighty men 
who thrust the three Jews into it were burned to death in obeying the king. 
Gazing, no doubt, from a safe distance, the king himself looks to see the fire 
consume the daring adventurers. He starts back in amazement. Eagerly his 



i;- 



PASSIXG THROUGH FIRE. 



courtiers press about him. " Did not we cast three men bound into the midst 
of the fire ? *' he asks, with blanched face and trembling lips. 

" True, O King," answer the counsellors. 

" Lo, ' says the king, in a hushed, awed voice, " I see four men loose, walk- 
ing in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt ; and the form of the fourth 
is like one of the sons of the gods." Then, going as near as he dared to the 
furnace, the king himself called loudly, " Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, come 
forth of the midst of the fire." 

It may be no one else saw the angel walking with the three men, but all 
saw that they were unhurt; that there was not so much as the smell of fire 
about them. Nebuchadnezzar broke forth at onee in praise of the God who de- 
livered! his servants that trust in him and announced a decree, "That every 
people, nation, and language, which speak anything amiss against the God of 
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego shall be cut in pieces, and their houses shall 
be made a dunghill; because there is no other god that can deliver after this 
sort." 

We know nothing more of the three faithful Jews; they have long ago gone 
to their reward; but, surely, one of the joys of heaven will be to hear the story 
from their own lips, as those may who, like them, are faithful through all 
temptation. 




WEIGHED IN THE BALANCE. 

DANIEL V. 

You have read something of the wonders of Babylon, and when I tell you 
that almost all of the great walls and palaces were built by Nebuchadnezzar, and 
that, besides all this, he built about one hundred smaller towns, you will not be 
surprised to hear that he was proud of what he had accomplished. We know 
Nebuchadnezzar did do all this, because they used to stamp the name of the 
royal builder on every brick ; and we find his name on all these buildings. But 
he was warned that his pride was wrong, and that he was only able to do these 
deeds by Gods help. The way this warning came was through a dream. As 
you know, the people in those days valued their dreams and tried to interpret 
them. Daniel, like Joseph at the court of Pharaoh, was not only able to interpret 
a dream for Nebuchadnezzar, but told the vision itself, which the king could not 
recall. From that time Daniel held high positions at the court. Some years after 
the king had another remarkable dream. At first the regular seers and magicians 
of the court were called ; but they failed to satisfy the king, and Daniel was sent 
for. When he heard the dream, for an hour he stood lost in wonder, and showed 
so plainly that he dreaded telling the king — whom he truly loved — the interpreta- 
tion, that Nebuchadnezzar told him to have no fear, but to speak out. So Daniel 
told the king that his dream meant that for seven years he — the great king of 
Babylon — would be driven out from among men, and would cat grass with the 
beasts " till thou knowest that the Most High ruleth in the kingdoms of men." 
Then Daniel begged the king to break off from sin and oppression, and to show 
mercy to the poor, " if it may be a lengthening of thy tranquillity." 

But the king did not heed the warning. About a year after that, as he 
walked in his palace, he said aloud, " Is not this great Babylon, that I have built 
for the house of the kingdom by the might of my power, and the honor of my 
majesty?" 



i 74 WEIGHED IN THE BALANCE. 

" While the word was in the king's mouth, there fell a voice from heaven, 
saying, O king Nebuchadnezzar, to thee it is spoken; Thy kingdom is departed 
from thee: and they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling shall be with 
the beasts of the field: they shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and seven times 
shall pass over thee, until thou know that the Most High ruleth in the kingdom 
of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will," and that same day the kin-' was 
afflicted with a strange madness, and for seven years wandered about, eating the 
grass, fancying he was an ox. No doubt, at times, he was less wild, but lor seven 
years his son Evil-Merodach reigned in his place. At the end of that time, 
Nebuchadnezzar lifted up his eyes to heaven, and, as he himself tells us, "Mine 
understanding returned unto me, and I blessed the Most High, and I praised 
and honored him that liveth forever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion, 
and his kingdom is from generation to generation. And all the inhabitants of 
the earth are reputed as nothing: and he doeth according to his will in the army 
of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth : and none can stay his hand, 
or say unto him, 'What doest thou? At the same time my reason returned unto 
me : and for the glory of my kingdom, mine honor and brightness returned unto 
me; and my counsellors and my lords sought unto me; and I was established 
in my kingdom, and excellent majesty was added unto me. Now I, Nebuchad- 
nezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of heaven, all whose works are truth, 
and his ways judgment: and those who walk in pride he is able to abase." 

Now, as each king was apt to raise his own friends to the offices of trust, 
we hear no more of Daniel's being consulted at court alter the death of Nebu- 
chadnezzar till the reign of his grandson Belshazzar. It is believed that Nabona- 
dius was king, but that on the Persians declaring war with him he left the city 
of Babylon in charge of his brother Belshazzar, and led his army out to battle 
on the plains, where he was defeated and slain, after which the city of Babylon 
was besieged. The people of the city felt very secure, for there were large tracts 
within it which they could cultivate, and immense stores of provisions were laid 
up; enough, it is said, for twenty years. They considered their immense wall 
impregnable, as indeed it was. It is true the river Euphrates flowed through the 
citv ; but heavy gates closed down at each end on the water, so that nothing but 
the river could pass under. There were other gates all along the river's banks, 
but these the citizens, in their security, often left open. 




BELhIIAZZARS l'EAST. 



WEIGHED IN THE BALANCE. 

In spite of the siege, feasting and revelry went on, and one night Belshazzar 
gave a particularly superb feast to the lords and ladies of the court. The 
mightiest nobles and the fairest women were assembled in the banqueting-hall. 

They drank and feasted, pouring out wine to the gods. Suddenly Belshazzar 
thinks of a new way of honoring his guests. " Bring," he cries, " the golden ves- 
sels that the great king brought from Jerusalem ; the Hebrews call them sacred. 
We will consecrate them now by using them." And they drink, with many a 
jest, from the golden cups. But look! the king's face grows white; he lifts his 
arm and points far up on the wall opposite his throne. Oh ! awful mystery ! a 
shadowy hand is writing, in flaming characters, far above their heads! They look 
on in awed silence till the writing is finished, and the hand disappears. Then the 
king rouses himself, and promises rich rewards to any who can interpret the 
meaning of the strange characters. One and another try,' but all are unnerved 
and bewildered. The queen-mother, hearing of the strange occurrence, comes to 
her son and tells him that Daniel, who was his grandfather's interpreter, can 
surely soke the mystery. So Daniel is summoned, and stands before the king, 
who tells him of the promised rewards. The old man answers with quiet dignity: 
'"Let thy gifts be to thyself, and give thy rewards to another; yet I will read 
the writing unto the king, and make known to him the interpretation." 

The prophet then recalls God's dealings with Nebuchadnezzar, and reminds 
Belshazzar how little he has heeded the lesson of his grandfather's insanity. 
" Thou hast not humbled thine heart, though thou knewest all this ; but hast lifted 
up thyself against the Lord of heaven; and they have brought the vessels of 
his house before thee, and thou, and thy lords, and thy wives have drunk wine 
in them; and thou hast praised the gods which see not, nor hear, nor know; 
and the God in whose hand thy breath is, and whose are all thy ways, hast 
thou not glorified." Then he reads the Hebrew characters, and interprets them. 
Mene, iiiciic, tells that the kingdom is numbered and ended; Tekel, it is -<,'cig/iccf 
and found light; Peres, it is divided and given to the Persians (Pharsin). 

And now, while they sit in fear and trembling, let us see what i> going on 
in the Persian camp. Cyrus, the Persian general, has noticed that there is a 
gnat dam at the northern end o\ the city, and, on inquiry, finds that a vast 
basin has been formed outside the walls to receive the overflow caused by the 
spring freshets. This overflow was so great that it made a lake o\ fifty miles in 



WEIGHED IN THE BALANCE. \J7 

extent. He waits till the night of Belshazzar's feast. The great gates which 
spanned the river being securely closed, the Babylonians have left open the gates 
on the river banks. An army of workmen are sent by Cyrus to the dam, and, 
breaking it down, the river rushes through and fills the immense basin, running 
so low that the Persian soldiers can creep under the gates and walk along its 
bed, the water only reaching to their knees. They enter the city, killing all who 
oppose them. " Meet at the palace " was the order given, and hardly had the 
prophet's words died on the air before the enemy appears. " The Persians ! the 
Persians ! " passes from lip to lip. The king, sword in hand, faces the enemy ; 
but all is in vain, his doom has been pronounced, and " that same night was 
Belshazzar king of the Chaldeans slain." 

" Belshazzar's grave is made, 

His kingdom passed away ; 
He, in the balance weighed, 

Is light and worthless clay. 
The shroud his robe of state, 

His canopy the stone : 
The Mede is at his gate ! 

The Persian on his throne ! " 




JESUS! NAME OF WONDROUS LOVE. 

MATTHEW I. 21. 

Far up in Galilee, one hundred miles from the holy city, lived a young" girl 
named Man", who was betrothed to a man named Joseph; that is, they had prom- 
ised to marry each other before long. They were both humble people, but God- 
fearing and truly religious. Mary, we are told by an old tradition, " spoke little, 
and only what was to the purpose. She was very gentle, and showed respect 
and honor to all. She was of middle height, some say rather above it; she spoke 
to all with a prudent frankness, soberly, without confusion, and always pleasantly; 
she had a fair complexion, blond hair, and bright hazel eyes ; her eyebrows were 
arched and dark ; her lips ruddy and full of kindness when she spoke ; she had 
no pride, but was simple, and free from deceit." Joseph, we know, from his 
kindness to his betrothed, was a true, upright man. God told him that she whom 
he was to marry would soon give birth to a child, and that that child was the 
Son of God. So, keeping the wonderful secret to himself, he took her, as his wife, 
to Bethlehem, where he was obliged to go to be taxed. Perhaps Mary did not 
want to be left without the kind friend who alone knew what the angel had told 
her. Probably Mar}- rode on an ass — the animal so much thought of in Judea — 
and Joseph walked by her side. Passing down the little valley of Nazareth, they 
crossed the rich plain of Esdraelon, which was covered with cities and villages, 
with orchards, vineyards, gardens, and fields. They passed the mountains of Gil- 
boa, talking, perhaps, of Saul and of their mighty ancestor David, the second King 
of Israel. Dothan, where Joseph met his brethren, would come in sight on their 
right, and then the city of Samaria, just rebuilt by Herod, and named by him 
Sebaste, crowded with heathen temples. They probably rested at Svchar on the 
second day, not going into the town, for the Jews never mixed with the Samari- 
tans, but resting at Jacob's Well, eating the food they had brought with them; 
then passing as quickly as possible through Samaria, they entered Judea — bleaker 




THE NATIVITY. 



iSo JESUS! NAME OF WONDROUS LOVE. 

and barer, but far more dear to all loyal Jews. Shiloh was passed ; then Gilgal — 
the scene ot" the first passover in the Promised Land — and, at last, their feet would 
stand within the gates of Jerusalem; but they did not linger long there, for six 
miles beyond was Bethlehem, where they were to be taxed. This little village 
covered the upper slope and part of the top of a narrow hill. There were no 
inns at all at that time. " Kahns," a sort of rude shelter for travellers, were 
erected in barren and unfrequented spots; but in every village any passing way- 
farer was sure to be made some one's guest, for the rabbis taught the people 
that hospitality to strangers would be rewarded by an entrance into Paradise. So 
we may be sure that it was not at an inn that Joseph and Mary found shelter. 
The same word that is translated inn (Luke ii. 7), in the only other places it is 
used refers to a guest-chamber in a friendly house. But, as strangers were pour- 
ing into Bethlehem for the taxation, the guest-chamber of their friend's house was 
full, and the only empty space was the place, half kitchen, half stable — -just a 
natural cave in the hillside — against which the house had been built. 

We are not told how long they stayed in Bethlehem ; Eastern people are 
never in a hurry. At any rate, here in the hollow of the hills Mary was given 
the God-sent child; he who was to "save his people from their sins." She laid 
her little one in a manger, but we must not think this was not a comfortable 
resting-place for the child. Dr. Thompson writes : " The mangers are built of small 
stones and mortar, in the shape of a kneading-trough; and, when cleaned up and 
whitewashed, as they often are in summer, they do very well to lay little babies 
in ; and though this was in the month of December, it was not cold or bleak as 
with us." 

On the very night when the child was born " there were in the same coun- 
try shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night 
And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone 
round about them; and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, 
Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to 
all people. For unto you is born this day, in the city of David, a Saviour, which 
is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you: Ye shall find the babe 

wrapped in swaddling-clothes, lying in a manger \nd the shepherds 

said one to another, Lit us now go even unto Bethlehem, ami see this thing 
which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us." 



JESUS/ NAME OF WONDROUS LOVE. 181 

For forty days Mary stayed at Bethlehem, never appearing outside the cave ; 
for, as a Jewess, her first visit was to be made to the synagogue or the temple. 
At last, riding on an ass, probably, as Jewish mothers did who were going to 
the temple to offer thanks, she offered two doves, and gave thanks to God for 
the gift of a child. Think for a moment what her thanks must have been ! 
"The Son of the Highest," the angel had told her he should be called. And, 
probably, as she bowed herself in prayer, she whispered softly, " My soul doth 
magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour." But another 
ceremony had still to be performed. Jesus, as the first-born son, was to be " re- 
deemed " by the payment of a certain amount of money into the hands of the 
priest, and prayers were then offered up for the child. 

How soon after this came the visit of the Magi, and the hasty flight into 
Egypt, we cannot tell ; certainly the family were back in Nazareth before the 
child was three years old. Nazareth lies among the hills and overlooks one of 
the little corners of the plain of Esdraelon. In March, a traveller climbing up the 
steep road that leads to the village, would be charmed by the bright green of 
the plains and the beauty of the flowers ; the red anemone and the pink phlox 
are the commonest ; rock-roses, white and yellow, are plentiful, with a few pink 
ones. There is the pink convolvulus, marigold, wild geranium, and mignonette, 
with salvia and pimpernel. The village itself may have altered, but we can be 
quite sure that the same birds visited it then as now: larks, sparrows, nightin- 
gales, black-caps, wrens, swallows, and robin-redbreasts were as familiar to Him 
as to many boys nowadays. Great butterflies flitted on the hillsides, and flocks 
of sheep and goats dotted the plain below. 

Stand in fancy where the boy Jesus must many times have stood — at the top 
of the hill behind the village. Galilee spreads out like a map at one's feet, Mount 
Tabor rises near at hand, and beyond it is Little Hermon. Turn to the west, and 
Carmel, " Elijah's Mountain " to every boy, is only twenty miles off. Looking 
from northwest to north, the cottages of Cana of Galilee can be seen, where 
Jesus was to first use his miraculous power. Mountains rise above mountains to 
the north, till, more than sixty miles off, Hermon stands ten thousand feet above 
the sea. 

Here, in their mountain home, lived Mary and Joseph, with Jesus and the 
brothers and sisters who were given later. The white, flat-roofed houses in Naza- 



182 JESUS! NAME OF WONDROUS LOVE. 

reth to-day are doubtless much the same as those among which He played as a 
child. Vines shaded the walls, doves sunned themselves on the roofs. Inside the 
house, a few mats on the floor, a built seat, running along' the wall, spread with 
cushions and the bright quilts on which the inmates sleep at night; a painted 
chest in the corner; some large clay water-jars, their mouths filled, perhaps, with 
sweet herbs to keep the water cool and fresh ; a low, round, painted wooden stool, 
brought at meals into the middle of the room to hold the tray and dish, round 
which the household sat, with crossed knees, on mats ; this was all the furniture 
in such a home as Mary's. 

Joseph worked at his trade of carpentering, but the many festivals of the 
Church, which made labor unlawful for full two months of the year, gave him time 
to instruct the children in the sacred history of his nation. A Jewish boy began 
at five years of age to commit the books of Moses to memory ; and, indeed, as 
soon as a child could speak it learned the morning prayers. At six years old a 
Jewish boy was sent to school. The children sat on benches or on the ground, 
according to their ages, the master sitting on a raised seat. The younger chil- 
dren had some simple part of the Bible carefully written out, which they repeated 
till it was learned by heart. 

There are many foolish legends as to the wonders of Christ's childhood, but 
not one has the stamp of truth. He was a simple child — the one perfect boy — 
a loving, obedient son. Take the sweetest little one you know, and as that little 
one is when all goes well, so was the little Jesus at all times. As the best boy 
is when things are all right and pleasant for him, so was Jesus every day. Day 
by day he increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man. 




THE FIRST VISIT TO HIS FATHER'S 

HOUSE. 

LUKE II. 41-52. 

When Jesus was twelve years old he went up to Jerusalem to the feast of 
the passover, with Joseph and Mary. This feast began about the 15th of April, 
and lasted seven days. The multitudes flocking to the city must have been 
almost countless ; over two million people worshipped at the temple at the great 
feast. Every house was crowded and the whole landscape covered with tents or 
booths of mat and wicker-work. Jerusalem itself was built upon hills. The road 
from Nazareth entered the new lower town by the Damascus gate, and passed 
through the business street in the bottom of the Valley of the Cheesemakers, 
which was a deep, narrow hollow between Mount Zion and Moriah, crowded 
with houses. The clothes bazaar, braziers' shops, the bazaar of the butchers, and 
one for the wool-dealers, were in this part of the town ; and here, too, was the 
square where notice was given of the new moon and feasts of each month. The 
old, or upper city, was on the top of Mount Zion ; here were the goldsmiths* 
shops, and the houses of the priests that lived at Jerusalem ; along its north side 
was a wall over fifty feet high, and outside this wall, towering one hundred and 
twenty feet above it, stood three castles, which Herod the Great had built, all of 
white marble. Close at hand was the palace of Herod, shining within with gold 
and silver, and many of the walls and ceilings crusted with precious stones. The 
handsomer dwelling-houses were in this upper city. 

On Mount Moriah rose the wonderful temple. The foundation on which 
this was built was as remarkable as the building itself. The hill was steep, 
and the top not large enough for the great courts ; so a solid wall of 
masonry, six hundred feet long and almost as high as the tallest church spire, 
was built up from the valley below. On the top of this immense wall was 



,8 4 THE FIRST VISIT TO HIS FATHER'S HOUSE. 

the royal porch, a building longer and higher than one of the great English 
cathedrals. 

Most of us think of the temple as a very large building, but this is a mis- 
take; the temple itself was not nearly so large as man)' modern churches; but 
it was surrounded by courts, each one larger and more beautiful than the other. 
Let us suppose, then, that we are \ isiting the temple as it stood in the time of 
Christ. You remember Solomon's temple had been destroyed long before ; then, 
about five hundred years before Christ, the Temple of the Exile, as it was called, 
was built, and Herod the Great, eighteen years before the time of Christ, had set 
about the restoration of the temple, employing constantly eighteen thousand men 
upon it; but it was not entirely finished till a.d. 65, just five years before its 
total destruction by the army of Titus ! 

Still, when Jesus, as a boy of twelve, went up to the temple to keep the 
feast, the walls were complete and the Sanctuary itself stood in all its wondrous 
beauty — made of great blocks of white marble, and all its front overlaid with 
pure gold — on the top of Mount Moriah. The whole temple-grounds were six 
hundred feet wide on every side. A great high wall, built up from the solid 
rock, of immense stones, enclosed this space. The front faced the east, but in 
this outer wall there were four gateways in the back, or on the west, and only 
one in each of the other sides. Come in at the Royal Gate on the east side; 
these gates were all marvels of strength and workmanship, from sixty to eighty 
feet high. Look now at these double rows of great marble columns, each of 
one solid piece, thirty-seven and one-half feet high, and so large round that 
three men, with arms extended, could just clasp hands around them. This is 
Solomon's porch. Look far up above your head; see the solid roof of polished 
cedar, so strongly built that soldiers can march about on it and look down at 
the crowds entering at the different gateways. Before going further on let us 
turn to the left, where is a still wider porch; this, with four rows of those im- 
mense columns, is the royal porch, ahead) referred to; you can walk all along it, 
and on the west and north sides you will still find two rows o( the wonderful 
columns, till you stand again in Solomon's porch. On every side a low stone 
wall, four and one-half feet high, shuts you out from polluting the Court of Israel, 
and those small obelisks or pillars that are set in the wall, at equal distances, 
wain us in Latin and Greek that no Gentile can pass within, undei pain of 




JESUS QUESTIONING 'HIE DOCTORS. 



186 THE FIRST VISIT TO HIS FATHER- S HOUSE. 

death. The Jewish boy, passing beyond this fence, on the eastern side, goes up 
a flight of fifteen steps, where is a high wall again, with beautiful gates opening 
into the Court of the Women. This court is the usual place of worship for all, 
but women cannot pass beyond it. Here is the Gate Beautiful spoken of in 
Acts iii. 2. It was made of Corinthian brass, was sixty feet high, and, when 
closed each night, twenty men were needed for the work. Here, in the Court of 
the Women, was another porch, with one single row of columns, each pillar of 
the size and beauty of those in the Court of the Gentiles. Crossing the court, 
you go up fifteen steps again to the gate leading into the Court of Israel. Enter- 
ing, a little further on, you mount twelve more steps, and there stands the great 
brazen altar, seventy-five feet square and twenty-two and one-half feet high, with 
steps leading up it on the south side. Beyond the altar is the temple ; its vesti- 
bule, which is never closed, for it has no doors, is seventy-five feet long, thirty 
feet wide, and one hundred and thirty-five feet high. It is all plated with gold, 
with vines and grapes of solid gold clustering up over the entrance. At the end 
of the vestibule hangs the first veil, and behind that are doors, leading into the 
Sanctuary or Holy Place, where stands the candlestick, table of shewbread, and 
altar of incense. This Sanctuary is sixty feet long, thirty feet wide, and ninety 
feet high. At the further end hangs the second veil, which hides the Holy of 
Holies — perfectly empty now. The lost ark was never replaced. On each side 
of the Holy Place are rooms used by the high-priest. It is one of these rooms 
that is represented in the picture. 

At twelve years of age a Jew was treated as a man. so that Jesus, at the 
time of his first visit to Jerusalem, was free to go and come, not watched as a 
child, and we may be sure he was often at the temple through all the passov< - 
week. The passover itself was eaten in the different houses; not fewer than ten 
and as many as twenty were allowed to eat the feast together. Women were not 
[uired to eat the passover, but were allowed to do so if they chose. Every- 
thing was done in haste, as the lambs had to be killed, roasted, and eaten 1 
tween three in the afternoon and twelve at night At midnight the temple gates 
were opened, and the people, most of whom stayed up all night, thronged the 
courts in holiday dress, carrying their thank-offering o\ meat. The priests took a 

< rtain share of this and then returned tin: fest to the givers, who had it cooked 
for them in the Court of the Women and ate it as a second feast in one ot the 



'HE FIRST VISIT TO HIS FATHER'S HOUSE. 187 

temple porches. The 15th was one of the six work-days in the year on which 
no work could be done, and was taken up with free-will offerings at the temple. 
On the 16th the first fruits from the Kidem valley were brought to the temple 
and waved before the Lord. Jesus no doubt saw this ceremony, and noticed, as 
he left the temple, how quickly the streets were filled with men selling new barley 
bread, parched ears of the new corn, and early fruits of all kinds. From the 17th 
to the 20th were only half holidays, and many left the city. The last day, the 21st, 
was kept as a sabbath, and there was a rehearsal of the passover supper for those 
who had not been able to reach Jerusalem on the first great day. The passover 
finished, all prepared to return home, and all was confusion and uproar. The start 
was always made in the night, by torchlight, so as to avoid the heat of the 
day. There was real clanger in the narrow places that women or children might 
be trampled on by the animals. Parents were often heard calling for lost children ; 
friends shouted to each other; the drivers beat and scolded the poor animals. But 
as the roads branched off things grew pleasanter, and by the time the first day's 
march was ended all was in order. It was at this time that his parents first 
became alarmed as to Jesus, and returned at once to Jerusalem ; but, as they 
could not reach it until the evening of the second day, nothing could be done 
till the day after, when — knowing, no doubt, his love for the temple — they found 
him in one of the schools of the rabbis, held in the temple courts. These 
schools were open to all, and any one could answer or propose a question. 
The rabbi sat on a high seat, with his scholars in a half circle at his feet. 
The one study was the Law (that is, the Books of Moses), and what cer- 
tain rabbis had written or said of it. Here his parents find him, looking, it 
may be, like David when summoned before Samuel, " ruddy and of fair counte- 
nance," his large eyes bright with thoughts of his Father. Mary takes her 
boy one side, and says : " Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us ? Behold, 
thy father and I have sought thee, sorrowing." The answer must have fallen 
on Marys heart as a soft rebuke. " How is it that ye sought me ? There 
was no place where I could so surely be as in my Father's house — there 
were no matters which could so rightfully fill my thoughts as his." Her 
son was outgrowing his childhood ; the light of a higher world was breaking 
in on his soul. Yet his " hour had not yet come ; " " and he went down to 
Nazareth, and was subject unto them." 



THE MAN CHRIST JESUS. 

ACTS X. 38. 

From the time of His return to Nazareth, after the visit to Jerusalem, till 
he was about thirty years of age, we know nothing of the Saviour's life but that 
he worked at Joseph's trade, supporting, it is believed, his widowed mother. He 
began his work in the world by going to John the Baptist and reeeiving baptism 
at his hands. John refused this at first, for he felt unworthy to baptize his Lord ; 
but at Christ's command he obeyed : and while Jesus was being baptized the 
Spirit descended upon him in the form of a dove. Forty days of trial and temp- 
tation in the wilderness followed, and then Jesus came forth and stood before 
men as a rabbi or teacher. The rabbis each had their chosen disciples, who, if 
they did not live with them, were always in their company when journeying or 
teaching. So Jesus chose disciples; twelve men, most of them unlearned, plain, 
and poor. The first two, Andrew and John, had been with John the Baptist; 
but followed Jesus when their master pointed him out as the Lamb of God. He, 
hearing their footsteps, turned and invited them to join him! Andrew then found 
his brother Simon Peter, and John his brother James, and brought them to the 
Saviour; so when Jesus returned once more to Cana of Galilee, where his mother 
was, he had four disciples, and a fifth, Philip, joined them before they reached 
(ana. 

Some intimate friend or relation of Mary's was to be married in Cana, and 
I us, with his disciples, was invited to the feast. A marriage in the East is a 
great event, the festivities usually lasting some days. A Jewish maiden was always 
married on a Wednesday, so we know the day on which this feast began. The 
bride, whose dress and ornament-, with perfumes, ointment, and fruit, were sent 
by the bridegroom in the early part of the wedding-day, was thickly veiled Irom 

i to foot; with a wreath oi myrtle-leaves, either natural or of gold, on her 
head. She waited at her mother's house for her bride-room, to whom, on that 




JESUS HEALING THE SICK. 



190 



THE MAX CHRIST JESUS. 



day, she had sent his shroud, which he wore on each New-Year's-Day and Day 
of Atonement during his life. The bridegroom came in the evening, with flute- 
players and singers, groomsmen and friends, while the girl-friends of the bride 
joined the procession, dancing and singing the bride's praises. All then went 
together to the house of the bridegroom's father, where the bride sat veiled among 
the women, and the bridegroom, crowned and decked with ornaments, sat among 
his friends. Singing, music, dancing, guessing of riddles, and merry jokes amused 
the guests night after night. The wine used was light, and none drank to excess, 
for the people were warned against drunkenness. Here is one of the parables by 
which the rabbis taught the danger that lurked in the vine : "When Noah planted 
his vineyard, Satan came and asked him what he was doing. ' Planting a vine> 
yard,' was the reply. 'What is it for?' 'Its fruits, green or dry, are sweet and 
pleasant: we make wine of it, which gladdens the heart." 'I should like to have 
a hand in the planting,' said Satan. 'Good,' replied Noah. Satan then brought a 
lamb, a lion, a sow, and an ape, killed them in the vineyard, and let their blood 
run into the roots of the vines. From this it comes that a man, before he has 
taken wine, is simple as a lamb, which knows nothing, and is dumb before its 
shearers; when he has drunk moderately he grows a lion, and thinks there is not 
his like; if he drinks still more, he turns a swine, and wallows in the mire; if 
he drinks still more, he becomes a filthy ape, falling hither and thither, and 
knowing 1 nothing of what he does." 

The feast to which Jesus was invited had lasted some time, when, to the 
great distress of those in charge, the wine gave out. Mary, who, like every true- 
hearted woman, liked to help her friends, hoped Jesus might know some way out 
of the difficulty. She had noticed the change in her son since His visit beyond 
[ordan; she felt that He had power — would not this be an excellent opportunity 
to exercise it? So she went to Him and said. "They have no wine. Jesus saith 
unto her, Woman, what have I to do with thee? Mine hour is not yet come.'' 
Do not think that Jesus answered her rudely. The term "woman" was then, as 
it always should be, a term of honor and dignity. That Mary understood the 
Saviour's words is shown in her telling the servants, "whatsoever he saith unto 
you, do it." A little later, before the wine had become quite exhausted, Jesus 
told the servants to fill the large waterpots which stood by with water, and then 
pour out and give to the ruler of the feast. The ruler, as he tasted the fresh 



THE MAN CHRIST JESUS. 191 

supply, was relieved from all anxiety, and went at once to the bridegroom to 
tell him that this last wine 'was the best of all. 

This "beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested 
forth his glory; and his disciples believed in him." From that day He went about 
doing good. Often such scenes occurred as the one given in the picture; mothers 
brought their sick children ; the lame hobbled to him ; the blind crept near, or 
cried aloud as they heard his passing footsteps. 

One of the most loathsome diseases of the East is that of leprosy. A leper 
was believed, in the time of Christ, to be under God's curse. No leper was 
allowed to live in a walled town, and they were obliged to go with uncovered 
head, and to continually cry, " Unclean ! unclean ! " to warn others away. The 
disease began with little specks on the eyelids and on the palms of the hands ; 
the hair became w 7 hite and wiry ; the skin was covered with shining scales, swell- 
ings, and sores; the nails fell off; the eyes, throat, and lungs were affected; and, 
at last, the sufferer died of consumption or dropsy. Never had a man " full of 
leprosy " been cured" till Christ, with his touch, healed not one, but many. That 
Christ would touch one who was " unclean " was an awful offence to the strict 
Pharisees, who would not break the law, even to relieve from suffering. 

All day long Christ was using his power, and we must not think it cost him 
nothing. " This kind," he said to his disciples, speaking of a devil whom he had 
cast out, "goeth not out but by prayer and fasting." He spent whole nights in 
prayer, and was often weary. The very sight of all the sin and suffering was a 
daily pain to him. 

Would you like to hear how he looked ? We have no likeness of the 
Saviour, for the Jews thought it was breaking the second commandment to paint 
any likeness of the human face, or make any statues. The Romish and Greek 
churches have several legends as to likenesses of Christ, but none of them are 
to be depended upon. They say, for instance, that the king of Edessa once sent 
a painter to Jesus to take his portrait, but the Saviour's face was so dazzling the 
artist could not paint it; then Jesus, willing to reward the king's devotion, im- 
pressed his likeness on a cloth, and sent that by the artist. Another legend is 
that the likeness of the Saviour was left upon the linen cloth in which he was 
wrapped at the burial. The following description of the Saviour is by one who has 
studied carefully the legends as to his appearance, and the dress of that period; 



I 9 2 THE MAX CHRIST JESUS. 

"Our eyes were resistlessly attracted to Him, for he was the centre of the 
■nip. He was not in soft clothing of byssus and silk, like the courtiers of 
Tiberias or Jerusalem, nor did he wear long, trailing robes like some of the 
Pharisees. On his head was a white keffiyeh — a square of linen doubled so that 
a corner fell down on each shoulder and on the back; a fillet or agbul round 
the head, keeping it in its place. On his body he wore a tunic, which reached 
to his wrists and to his feet, and over this a blue tallith, with the prescribed tas- 
sels of blue and white at the four corners, hung down so that the under-garment, 
which was gray striped with red, was little seen. I lis feet, shod with sandals — not 
shoes — were only visible now and then as he walked or moved. He was a man 
of middle size, with youthful beauty still in his face and form. The purity and 
charm of early manhood blended in his countenance with the ripeness of mature 
years. His complexion was fairer than that of those around him, for they had 
more of the bronze color of their nation. He seemed, indeed, even pale under 
the white sudar, for the ruddy glow of health, usual at his years, was wanting. 
The type of his features was hardly Jewish, but rather as if that and the Greek 
types blended into a perfect beaut}-, which, while it awakened reverence, filled the 
heart still more with love. His eyes looked on you with light which seemed 
broken and softened, as if by passing through tears, lie stooped a little, and 
seemed as if communing with his own thoughts, and when he moved there was 
no affectation, as with some of the rabbis, but a natural dignity and grace, like 
one who feels himself a king though dressed in lowly robes." 




THE PEOPLE OF SAMARIA. 

JOHN IV. 

Lying between Galilee on the north, and Judea on the south, you find on 
any map of Palestine a country marked Samaria. Now, you know very well 
that the Galileans were Jews, though rather rougher and more countrified than 
the people of Judea; but perhaps you cannot understand why the Samaritans 
were not Jews too ? If you have read the earlier chapters in this book, you 
know that Sargon repeopled Samaria with heathen colonies. These heathen found 
the ruined towns infested with lions, which increased so rapidly that the heathen 
thought the God of the country had sent them as a plague. They decided to 
learn the worship of this God, and sent for one of the exiled priests to instruct 
them. At first they worshipped their heathen gods, with the true God ; but, after 
a time, their children became very earnest believers in God, obeying the law of 
Moses most rigidly. They begged to be admitted among the Israelites ; but the 
proud children of Abraham would not hear of it; every Jew was taught to hate 
and despise a Samaritan, or a " Cuthite " — as they were called — and so, very 
naturally, the Samaritans, in turn, learned to hate and despise the Jews, and each 
did the other all the mischief they could. 

The Samaritans claimed that Mount Gerizim was holier than Mount Moriah. 
They believed it to be the site of the Garden of Eden, and that Adam was 
formed of its dust. Even to this day the few Samaritans still living show the 
spot where Adam's altar was supposed to stand. They thought Mount Gerizim 
was the mountain on which the ark rested. Every Samaritan child could point 
out the places on the mount where Noah came out of the ark, and where he 
built his altar. Abraham, according to them, offered up Isaac on Gerizim, and in 
the centre of the summit was the stone which served as a pillow for Jacob when 
he saw the vision of the angels. 

The hatred between the Jews and Samaritans was so strong that neither 



194 THE PEOPLE OF SAMARIA. 

ever expected help of the other. When the Saviour was a boy he must have 
heard how the Samaritans had stolen into the temple the night before the cele- 
bration of the passover, and defiled it by strewing- human bones in it. All along 
the border between Judea and Samaria there were constant skirmishes and raids, 
Aery much as it was in the last century between Scotland and England. No 
Israelite could lawfully eat even one mouthful of food that had been touched by 
a Samaritan. A Jew might be friendly with a heathen, but never with a Samari- 
tan ; nor need he keep his word with one. But, as the country of Samaria pro- 
duced delicious fruits, the rabbis did not pronounce Samaritan fruits unclean if 
thered by a Jew. 

In passing from Judea to Galilee, the most direct way was through Samaria, 
but so much was it hated that most Jews preferred the longer route through 
Perea. Jesus knew no such prejudice; and, starting from Judea in the early 
morning, he reached Sychar about noon. Near the town was an ancient well, no 
doubt dug, as claimed, by Jacob's servants; and here Jesus sat down to rest 
while his disciples went to the village to buy bread. This well is now seventy- 
five feet deep, but in 1838 it was thirty feet deeper. The custom of throwing 
-tones in the well to hear them rebound has no doubt filled it up at least one- 
half. While resting on the seat under the alcove of the well, with the pleasant 
-hade of the trees all about him, a woman came to draw water. The Saviour 
asked her for a drink. This simple request astonished her. " How is it," she 
asked, " that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me. which am a woman of 
Samaria?" The question no doubt was asked as the water was given. Jesus, 
having received it, tells her of a wondrous living water he can give. The woman 
listens wonderingly; and, feeling that this stranger is not an ordinary man, she 
puts to him the great question of the Samaritans, "Our fathers worshipped in this 
mountain ; and ye saw That in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to wor- 
ship." The way she puts the question — mentioning Jerusalem respectfully — shows 
that she is humble and teachable. 

"Believe me," -aid the Lord, "an hour comes when ye shall neither in this 
mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father. Ye worship God without know- 
ing him, ignorantly. We bus worship that which our having received tin- Scrip- 
tures has taught us to know. The Messiah and his salvation must come from 
anion- the Jews; but, though the Jews be light, a- against the Samaritans, in 




JESUS AND THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA. 



ujG THE PEOPLE OP SAMARJA. 

far as relates to the past, both are on equal footing as to the far more glorious 
future. An hour comes, and now is, when the true worshippers will worship the 
Father in spirit and in truth."' 

The woman answered simply, not understanding what the Saviour meant, " I 
know that Messiah comes, that is called Christ. When he shall come, he shall 
tell us all things." lesus answered, "I that speak unto thee am he." 

The first to hear of the Saviours birth were humble shepherds ; the first per- 
son to whom the Saviour declared himself the Messiah, was a despised Samaritan. 

It is not the only time that we see that Christ cared for the Samaritans and 
was accepted by them. The one leper out of the ten whom he healed, that re- 
turned to thank him, was a Samaritan; and in his answer to the rabbi's ques- 
tion. "Who is my neighbor?" Jesus holds up a Samaritan as "neighbor" to him 
who fell among thieves. 

The disciples must have been greatly surprised to find their Lord talking 
with a woman. In Christ's time women were kept very closely, and not allowed 
to go out unveiled. Rabbis especially would not speak to a woman in public. 
The rabbis tried to keep women as ignorant as possible. " Let the words of the 
Law be burned rather than committed to a woman," was one saying; "He who 
instructs his daughter in the Law instructs her in folly," another. But Jesus came 
to raise woman, and treated her as the equal of man. 

Strange as it must have seemed to the disciples to see the Master talking 
with a Samaritan woman, they already felt too much reverence for Jesus to ques- 
tion the right of so doing. The woman left her pitcher at the well, and hurried 
off to bid her friends come and see if this man were not the Christ, and soon 
a little crowd came toward the Saviour and his disciples. Jesus seeing them, 
said to his friends, "Ye say after four months will dome the harvest; but I say, 
Look yonder at the throng coming toward us: they are the noblest harvest, and 
their coming shows that you have not to wait to reap it, a- they have to reap 
the seed now sowing, for their souls, like autumn fields, are alread) white for 
the sickle, and how rich the reward for you my disciple^ who will be the reapers." 
The Samaritan^ who were brought to the wall by the woman heard the Saviour 
idly, and at their request he stayed with them two days, teaching them. "We 
id tin- Samaritans to the woman, "'not because of thy speaking, for we 
have heard u>v ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Saviour of the world." 



THE PEOPLE OF SAMARIA. 197 

It was at this time that John the Baptist was thrown into prison by Herod 
Antipas. Jesus, as John's friend and cousin, must have felt sorrowful at the news, 
and as the Bridegroom whose friend John was, He knew that John's suffering and 
martyrdom was but a foreshadowing of His. In the Lord's sorrow he turned for 
a last time to his earthly home. Dismissing his disciples for a time, he went 
alone to Nazareth, teaching and healing on the way. How long he rested in 
his mother's house is not known ; no miracles marked his stay, but day by day 
we may be sure he was present in the synagogue, worshipping with his brethren. 

The Jewish synagogue in Christ's day was a very plain building, though often 
built of the purest marble. On one side, as you entered, were seats for the men ; 
on the other, behind a lattice, the wonien, wrapped in their long veils, sat and 
worshipped. At the end was the tebhah, or ark, of painted wood, which held the 
rolls of Scripture, and at one side of this was the Mma, an elevated seat for the 
reader, who was any one who had a reputation for learning and had been invited 
by the chief of the synagogue to take that part of the service. In the chief seats 
sat ten or more " men of leisure," one of them the chief of the synagogue. The 
chazzan, or " angel," was the man who had the care of the scripture rolls, handing 
them to the reader. After the prayers two lessons were always read, one from 
the Law, or books of Moses, and one from the Prophets. 

On a certain Sabbath Jesus was invited to read the second lesson. He 
ascended the bhna and was handed the roll of the prophet Isaiah. How His 
human heart must have thrilled as He read the lesson for the day: "The Spirit 
of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the Gospel to 
the poor; he hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to 
the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are 
bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord." 

Closing the book, he sat down and "began to say unto them, This day is 
this scripture fulfilled in your ears." Wonderingly they listened as he spake, as 
never man spake, but gradually one and another murmured, " Is not this Josephs 
son ? " — He was but a carpenter in their eyes ! Soon the murmur rose to a great 
cry, and with angry words they dragged him to a precipice near by to stone him 
for blasphemy. But he, by no miracle, but simply by the spell of his genuine 
goodness and truth, passed through the midst of them and went his way. 



THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN. 

LUKE XVIII. 10. 

The Jews, hating the Romans because they were their masters, hated any of 
their own people who took any public office under the conquerors. A Jew, for in- 
stance, who collected taxes was more despised than a Roman tax-collector. These 
publicans, as they were called, were often dishonest men; but, to the Jews, it made 
no difference whether they were honest or not. The publican was, especially to 
the Pharisee, the same as a thief or a murderer; no strict Jew would eat or talk 
with a publican. " Bears and lions," said a Jewish proverb, " might be the fiercest 
wild beasts in the forest, but publicans an,d informers were the worst in the cities." 

But just because these men were cast out by the Jews, Jesus sought them 
out, and was a Friend to them. Matthew, the sixth disciple that was called, was 
a publican. In his delight at being chosen as a disciple he made a feast and 
invited his friends, who must of necessity have been publicans like himself. No 
doubt there were among them many dishonest men, but Jesus sat down with them. 

"This man receiveth sinners,"* the Jews exclaimed with horror, as we do now 
with joy. 

The Pharisee was the very opposite to the despised publican : he felt sure 
of heaven, claiming it as his right, for was he not the favorite of heaven? His 
whole time was given up to studying the traditions of the rabbis, which traditions 
were considered more important than the Scriptures. The words o( the rabbis 
were held to be worth more than the words of the prophets. There were tradi- 
tions among the Pharisees of miracles which they claimed to have happened to 
confirm the sayings of rabbis. One cried out, when his opinion was disputed, 
"May this tree prove that I am right!'' and at once the tree was torn up by the 
roots and hurled an hundred ells off. But his opponents declared that a tree 
< nuld prove nothing. "May this stream, then, witness for me!" cried Eliezer, and 
at once it flowed the opposite way. Still his opponents declared that water could 




THE PHARISEE -AND THE PUBLICAN. 



200 THE PHARISEE AXD THE PUBLIC AX. 

prove nothing. "Now," said Eliezer, "if truth be on my side may the walls of 

the sehool confirm it!" He had scarcely spoken when the walls of the school 
began to bow inward. The rabbi Joshua threatened them : " What is it to you if 
the sons of the wise dispute? You shall not fall;" and to honor rabbi Joshua 
the walls did not fall wholly together, but neither did they go back to their 
places, that the honor of rabbi Eliezer might not .suffer, but remain slanting' to 
this daw At last Eliezer called for the decision of heaven. "If I am right, let 
heaven witness I Then came a voice from heaven, and said, "Why dispute ye 
with rabbi Eliezer? He is always right." 

The Pharisee was easily known by the broad fringe to his dress, the great 
size of the four tassels on his tallith, and the large phylacteries, or little boxes 
containing scripture texts, which he wore strapped on his forehead and right arm. 
They prayed aloud, and took care that all should hear of any alms they gave. 
Some of them were sincere, devoted men — Pharisees from love to God — but, as 
a class, they were hypocrites, as Jesus called them, making numberless laws for 
the common people, and secretly breaking them themselves. One can better 
understand how these Pharisees bound heavy burdens on men's shoulders 
Christ said), by hearing a few of the laws which they made as to the Sabbath. 
"The day began at sunset on Friday and ended with sunset on Saturday; and, 
as the disappearance of the sun was the only mark of the time, its commence- 
ment was different on a hill-top and in a valley. If it were cloudy, the hens 
going to roost was the signal. The beginning and the close o\ the Sabbath was 
announced by a trumpet. All food must be prepared, all vessels washed, and all 
lights kindled before sunset. The money-girdle must be taken off", and all tools 
laid aside. On Friday, before the beginning of the Sabbath, no one must go out 
of his house with a needle or a pen lest he forget to lay them aside before the 
Sabbath opens. Every one must also .search his pockets at that time to see that 
there is nothing left in them with which it is' forbidden to go out on the Sab- 
bath. To wear one kind of sandals was 'carrying a burden,' while to wear 
another kind was not. It was unlawful to go out with wooden sandals or shoes 
which had nails in the soles, or with a shoe and a slipper, unless one loot were 
hurt It was unlawful for any one to i arr\ .1 loaf <^n the public street; but il 
tw<> carried it, it was not unlawful. The quantity of u^oA that might be carried 
on tii'- Sabbath was settled by the rabbis; it must be less in bulk than a dried 



THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN. 201 

fig; if of honey, only as much as would anoint a wound; if water, as much as 
would make eye-salve; if ink, as much as would form two letters." 

To kindle or put out a fire was to break the Sabbath. Xo one could give 
an emetic or set a broken bone on the Sabbath, or even, according' to some 
rabbis, put back a bone that had slipped out of joint. If a person were buried 
under ruins he was to be left there, unless they were quite sure he was alive! 
The endless rules for washing and cleansing made life a real burden ; even the 
kind of water to be used for sprinkling the hands, for dipping vessels into, and 
for bathing, was settled by the rabbis. Drawn water was fit for certain things, 
cistern water for others. Two great Pharisees argued carefully as to whether it 
was lawful to eat an egg that had been laid on the Sabbath. Both agreed that 
if the hen was kept for laying, the egg must not be touched, or even looked at; 
but if the hen was to be cooked and eaten, and happened to lay an egg — what 
then ? Schammai thought a Jew might eat the egg, but Hillel decided against 
the egg, and he was obeyed. 

No wonder the kind and merciful Saviour longed to deliver the people from 
such slavery. The proud and powerful Pharisees received only warnings and 
stern reproofs from Jesus, while the despised publicans were treated with tender 
sympathy. 

Professor Geikie, in his "Life of Christ," gives the parable of the publican in 
these words : 

" Two men went up at the same time, the hour of prayer, to the temple, 
to pray. The one was a Pharisee, the other a publican. The Pharisee, who 
had seen the publican enter the temple with him, stood apart, his eyes toward 
the Holy of Holies, and began to pray thus : ' O God, I thank thee that I do 
not belong to the common multitude of mankind, whom thou hast rejected — to 
the covetous, the unjust, the adulterous. I thank thee that I am not what so 
many people are, what this publican here before thee is. He knows nothing of 
fasting or of tithes, but I fast every Monday and every Thursday, and I give 
the priests and Levites the tenth, not only of all I have, but of all I may gain, 
which is more than the Law requires.' 

" The publican, meanwhile, feeling that he was a sinner, stopped far behind 
the Pharisee, coming no further into the sacred court than its very edge, for he 
shrank from a near approach to God. Nor could he dare, in his lowly penitence, 



202 THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLIC AX. 

to lift up so much as his eyes to heaven, far less his head and his hands ; but, 
with bent head, smote on his breast in his sorrow, and said, 'God be merciful to 
me. tlie sinner.' 

"The Pharisee had offered only a proud, cold thanksgiving for his own 
merits; the publican an humble cry for mercy. Believe me, this publican, whom 
the Pharisee gave a place among the unjust and impure, received favor from 
God, and returned to his home forgiven and accepted; but the Pharisee went 
away unjustified; for, as I have often said, every one who thinks highly of him- 
self in religious things will be humbled before God, and he who humbles himself 
will be honored before him." 

This seems the fitting place to explain the difference between the Pharisees 
and the Sadducees. The Pharisees were the party who wished to make and keep 
the Jews a nation of priests ; the Sadducees considered the priests as separate 
from the common people and superior to them. The Pharisees insisted on 
studying' and obeying the Oral Law and the Traditions, but the Sadducees held 
only to the Written Law, and though they reverenced and obeyed some of the 
Traditions, they did not hold them binding. The Sadducees denied the resur- 
rection of the bod\', but the}' did not, as some say, deny the immortality of the 
soul. They were much more friendly to the heathen world about them, believing 
that one rule of conduct must guide them with Jews, and quite another with out- 
siders. The Pharisees would not allow any painting or sculpture about their 
dwellings, but the Sadducees admired beauty in itself and apart from religion, 
not believing, as did the Pharisees, that the second commandment forbids the 
painting or modelling of the human form, but only the worship of Mich painting 
or sculpture. The Sadducees did not hurt and worry the common people, a- did 
the Pharisees, and indeed had little influence among the Jews; it may be it was 
for this reason that Jesus never entered into controversy with them. His heaviest 
reproaches were tor the canting, selfish Pharisee. 




THE SEA OF GALILEE. 

JOHN VI. 

A large portion of the three last years of the Saviour's life was spent in 
Galilee, especially about the shores of its beautiful lake, or, as it is sometimes 
called, the Sea of Gennesareth. A very small sea it was, being only twelve 
miles long from north to south, and the widest part measuring but six and 
three-fourth miles. It is a beautiful sheet of water; and, in the Saviour's time, 
when its western side was crowded with villages, and the beautiful plain of Gen- 
nesareth — a spot on the west side covering about three square miles — was care- 
fully cultivated, it must have been still more beautiful. On this plain grew wheat, 
barley, rice, melons, grapes, date-palms, figs, citrons, and oranges. The climate of 
the lake-shore is so mild that snow seldom falls in winter. The lake is so full 
of fish that often their fins, rippling through the water, make it look as though 
rain were falling. In Christ's time the sea was alive with fishing-boats, for the 
fish were salted in great quantities at several of the towns. Beautiful cities, like 
Tiberias, with its splendid palace, great arsenal, and baths that were famous all 
over the country, were built on the lake-shore ; fishing-villages, like Capernaum 
and Bethsaida, with little, whitewashed stone houses, lay between, while on the 
east side the hills rose bare and bleak, with only about a quarter of a mile of 
green sward close to the lake. 

Here, in those barren, treeless hills, Jesus spent many a night in prayer; 
praying, as we know, not only for those that were with him, but for all that 
should believe in him through their word, and therefore for us. Capernaum, 
which was just at the northern end of the plain of Gennesareth, was for a time 
Jesus' home, and so is called, in the Bible, his own city. Seven of his disciples, 
Peter, John, James, Andrew, Matthew, James the Less, and Jude, lived in Caper- 
naum. Philip belonged to Bethsaida, which was close at hand ; Nathanael was 
from Cana. Thomas, tradition says, was a brother of Jesus. Simon Zelotcs 



;o4 



THE SEA OE GALILEE. 



(or The Zcaloti was from some part of Galilee, and only Judas Iscariot was 
from Judea. 

Though not large, Capernaum was a garrison town, with a band of soldiers 
and a centurion in charge. This Roman centurion had learned to believe in the 
true God, and had built the Jews a beautiful synagogue. It was of white lime- 

>ne; and though most of the stones have been carried oft" to build into hous 
a row of columns still show what the building was — no mean gift. This cen- 
turion must have been a kindly man; for, when his slave was ill, he sent mes- 
senger.^ to Jesus, asking that his servant might be healed. Jesus at once began 
to walk to the centurion's house, but a second set of messengers came to apolo- 
gize for troubling the Master, and soon after the centurion himself came to Jesus 
and told Him that, as he himself had servants that obeyed him, he knew that 
Jesus had but to speak the word and lie would be obeyed by those demons who 
had caused the disease. "When Jesus heard it, He marvelled, and said unto them 
that followed, Verily, I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in 
Israel. And they that were sent, returning to the house, found the servant whole 
that had been sick." 

To show how full of work the Saviour's life was, we find him, the day after 
this, twenty-five miles southwest of Capernaum, in a little village called Nairn 
Crowds were following him. All along the way we may be sure the sick and 
lame and blind had been brought to him, and not one was refused help. But as 
they entered the village, a little crowd was going out that did not join the happy 
throng — -one woman at least took no notice of any one; for her boy, the only 
comfort of her widowed life, was being carried to the grave. Now, as we read 
of what Jesus did. we must try to realize that no rabbi before him would touch 
or go near a dead body. He. first, in his loving pit)-, spoke to the mother, say- 
ing, "Weep not." Then he "touched the bier, and the bearers stood still, and 
he said: Young man, I say unto thee, arise. And he that was dead sat up and 

in to speak. And he gave him to his mother." This village was just on the 
other side of the hill where Shunem stood, where, centuries before, Elisha had 
given another mother back her boy. No wonder the people exclaimed, when they 
saw what Jesus had done, "A great prophet is risen among us!" 

An i I ;us had been for nearly two years preaching ami teaching, healing 
the -i< k and raising the dead, he sent his twelve disciples out, two by two, to 



206 THE SEA OF GALILEE. 

preach the gospel (good news) of the Kingdom. We do not know how long 
they left him. but probably not more than a icw weeks. At any rate, when he 
met them again at Capernaum, it was natural that they wished to be alone ; but 
the people crowded to this wonderful Man — -just as we would go now in great 
crowds if we heard that there was one who healed without money and without 
price. So Jesus and his disciples got into a little boat, and crossed the lake to 
the plain of Batiha. Ah, the people could not be left! They watched, and when 
they saw which way the boat was heading, they ran around by the shore. It 
was six miles by water, and about ten by land; but, when once the people had 
heard the Saviour talk, and seen what He could do, ten miles seemed but a little 
way to go to Him. In every village more joined them. They told the sick and 
the lame where he was. So, when the boat reached the shore, Jesus saw a great 
multitude gathering to hear him; "and he had compassion on them, and healed 
their sick." Then, sitting on the hillside, he spake unto them of the Kingdom of 
God, and taught them many things. 

The whole day went by, and still the people waited. There was no food to 
be had on the lonely plain, and the Twelve begged Jesus to send the crowd 
away. You can fancy how surprised they were when Jesus answered: "They have 
no need to go away; give ye them to eat."' The disciples, no doubt, looked at 
him in silent astonishment. At last Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, said : "There 
i- a lad here, which hath five barley loaves and two fishes; but what are the 
among so many?" Ah, Jesus wanted diem to do as much as they could — He 
would do the rest. He said: "Make the men sit down;'' and so they divided 
the crowd into companies of fifties and hundreds. As we know, there was one 
happy little lad there, and no doubt there were a number of boys and even girls 
from the villages nearest to the plain; then, I am quite sure, as the mothers had 
come, there were babies. As soon as all were quiet, "Jesus took the loaves, ami, 
having given thanks, he distributed to them that were set down: likewise also 
of the fishes, as much as they would." How that little lad must have wondered 
as he saw what Jesus could do with his bread and fishesl 1 hope he never 
forgot the lesson. Then, after all were satisfied, Jesus had the fragments taken 
up (let u- remember that when we are tempted to be wasteful), and they filled 

twelve little baskets! 

As soon as they saw this miracle, the crowd began to whisper to each other 



THE SEA OF GALILEE. 207 

that Jesus must indeed be the Messiah. "I care not for the Pharisees," said one, 
" they themselves say the Messiah will, like Moses, feed Israel in the wilderness, 
and has not Rabbi Jesus clone this?" "He is the Messiah!" "He is the Christ!" 
was shouted on all sides. "We need only to proclaim him king, and he will 
conquer our enemies the Romans, and set Israel free ! " 

But Jesus, telling his disciples to go to the boat and cross the lake, dis- 
missed the crowds and "withdrew into the mountain, and was there alone," 
praying for those who did not know enough to pray for themselves. The dis- 
ciples crossed the lake, not daring, perhaps, to wait, as they saw a storm coming. 
They had not started soon enough, for the storm, as furious as it was sudden, 
broke upon them. How they reminded each other of the night when Jesus had 
been asleep on a pillow, and, roused by their cry, had stilled the wind and the 
waves ! Oh, if Jesus were only with them, they think ! Then, suddenly, close to 
the boat, they saw, by a flash of lightning, a human form. They were terribly 
frightened at first, as any men would have been ; but, in a moment, they heard 
the Masters voice, calling " It is I, be not afraid," and they knew that all would 
be well. Peter could not wait till Jesus should get into the boat, but called out, 
" Lord, if it be Thou, bid me come unto Thee upon the waters." And Jesus said 
" Come." Peter, looking at the dearly loved Master, walked on the water ; but 
all at once he looked down on the heavy waves and lost courage. He began at 
once to sink, for it was only his faith that had kept him up. He just had enough 
faith to call out, " Lord, save me ! " and immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand 
and took hold of him, and said unto him, " O thou of little faith, wherefore didst 
thou doubt ? And when they were gone up into the boat, the wind ceased, and 
they that were in the boat worshipped him saying, Of a truth Thou art the 
Son of God ! " 




A LOWLY KING. 

MATTHEW XXI. 

It was Friday morning, the ninth Nisam, or, as we would say, March 30th, 
and great was the stir in Jerusalem ; for the next day, being" the Sabbath 
before the Passover, was a high day. The fields all about the city had been 
carefully examined and weeded ; the tombs had been fenced in and white- 
washed, that the travellers might see them from a distance, and avoid them ; 
for if a Jew's dress should touch a tomb he was defiled, and could not eat the 
passover. 

At the Joppa gate the crowd was thickest; donkeys with panier's full of len- 
tils, beans, onions, and cucumbers, brought from Galilee ; camels laden with grapes, 
dates, figs, apples, and pomegranates, stood or knelt; men and women with stone 
jars and leathern bottles full of "honey of wine'' and "strong drink'' cried out 
to the passers by to stop and take a cup of liquor; pedlars of cooking utensils, 
wearing apparel, ointments, singing-birds, and jewelry jostled one another; while 
animals of all kinds — donkeys, horses, calves, sheep, kids, and camels, swine only 
excepted — stood waiting purchasers. Passing through the market were Roman 
soldiers in shining breastplates and skirts of mail, and gladiators with sleeveless 
tunics reaching to their knees, who had been brought to the Holy City by Herod, 
and were hated by the Jews. Suddenly the people made way for a Jewish-looking 
man; his mantle was of snow-white linen; his robe richly embroidered and belted 
at the waist by a red sash with heavy gold fringe. The crowd seemed to dread 
his touch — was he a leper? No, but in the eyes of the [ews as bad, for he was 
a Samaritan, and his touch was pollution. Next came a figure whom all looked 
at with reverence; his head was bowed, his eyes fixed on the ground; but every 

now and then he stopped, crossed his hands upon his breast, and looked up to 

heaven as if praying. A leathern box (or phylactery) was tied on his forehead 
and another on his left arm; a deep fringe hung from the borders oi his robe, 




CHRIST'S ENTRY INTO JERUSALEM. 



cio A L WL Y KIXG. 

and enormou> tassels at the four corners of his tallith. He was a Pharisee, a 
Jewish Rabbi, whose word was law with the common people. 

But let us hear of what these two are talking: the mother, her veil covering 
all but her nose and mouth, sells wine; the boy is almost a man, yet he sits 
idle at her feet. Ah, no wonder, for he is blind! "Mother,"' says the boy, "what 
think you, will Me come to the feast?" "It is what all are asking, mv son; the 
rabbis, who say the Xazarene has a devil, and does all his great deeds by the 

devil's aid " "Say not so,"" interrupted the boy, passionately, "did not Joachim 

tell us only last Sabbath that he is the Messiah?" "True, my Simeon, and I said 
not he was aught else. I did but tell thee what the rabbis say. and we must not 
et that our friend Joachim has been cast out of the synagogue." "Ah, mother, 
he minds not that! the Xazarene — our Messiah — has seen and blessed him; but if 
Rabbi Jesus should come to the feast, you will bring me to him? You promise?" 
"Simeon, can you ask me! I have not your strong faith in the Nazarene ; but, if 
he come, you shall reach him, and may the God of our fathers grant your prayer." 

Just then the mother was called to serve a customer, and the blind boy sat 
unnoticed; again and again he went over the story of how- his friend had asked 
sight of Jesus, and over and over he whispered the prayer, "Jesus, thou Son of 
David, have mercy on me.*' How his heart swelled with rapture as he thought 
that before many days he too might hear the gracious words, " Go thy way ; thy 
faith hath made thee whole." 

Everywhere, in the temple-courts where rich tapestries were being hung in 
honor of the feast, in the different synagogues, and in the Roman palaces, people 
questioned, "Wall He come to the feast?" The lame, the sick, the blind, longed 
lor His coming. The priests and Pharisees, who hated Him, plotted for His life. 
1 1 is disciples would have kept Him back; but steadily Jesus came toward the 
Holy City, and on the afternoon of that Friday entered Bethany, which was one 
of the suburbs of Jerusalem. The Sabbath was spent at Bethany; and, though 
many of the sick came to be healed, Simeon and his mother did not hear, till 
late at night, that tin- Prophet of Nazareth had really come. Simeon wanted to 
start at once; but his mother told him it would not do to trouble the Master 
after nightfall. "Let me sell my wine," she said, "for an hour or two in the 

morning, and then, if he pass not through the gate, we will go to Bethany." So 

the blind boy waited as patiently as he could. 



A LOWL Y KING. 211 

Early on the next day Simeon and his mother took their stand at the gate 
now called St. Stephen's, leading into the new part of Jerusalem. Flags and ban- 
ners floated from the houses, in honor of the Passover. Simeon took no heed of 
what was going on around him ; his ears were strained to catch any word of his 
coming. At last he hears the chanting of a psalm. Soon others hear it, and 
Simeon catches such sentences as these: "Such a crowd are coming! They are 
Avaving palm-branches!" "Hark! hear what they sing: 

" Tell ye the daughter of Zien, 

Behold thy King cometh unto thee 

Meek, and riding upon an ass, 

And upon a colt, the foal of an ass." 

"See, see! there sits the One of whom they sing!" And all crowd to see Jesus 
riding in the midst of His followers. As the crowd pour through the gates, 
Simeon and his mother are pressed to the wall. " Who is this ? " ask the people ; 
and proudly the crowd of Galilean pilgrims shout, " This is Jesus, the Prophet of 
Nazareth, in Galilee." 

The wine bottles are left with a friend, and Simeon and his mother join the 
crowd which sweeps on even to the temple gates. There Jesus, dismounting, enters ; 
for, having ridden, he needs but to take off his sandals. Simeon and his mother, 
who are strict in their obedience to the law, cannot follow till they have washed 
their feet. But, after a time, they too stand in the Court of the Women, and 
hear, with beating hearts, the very children singing, " Hosanna, hosanna to the 
Son of David ! " 

Standing there, his wonderful face beaming with love and pity, Jesus receives 
all who would ask aught of him. Now it is a mother, who brings her children 
to be blessed by the Master; his disciples know better than to hinder her, for 
had not Jesus said, "Suffer the little ones to come unto me?" So each child 
receives a blessing, and the mother goes away with a light heart. Again, it is a 
lame man, or a paralytic, or a daughter tormented by evil spirits — each one is 
granted what he asks, and remains to give thanks. 

"Jesus, Son of David! Jesus, Son of David!" It is Simeon — his mother has 
brought him as near as she can ; and, in his earnestness, he is crying louder than 
he need. " What wilt thou ? " says a gentle voice at his side, and Simeon forgets 



212 A LO WL Y KING. 

all else in bis desire to see the One who speaks. "O that I might see thee!" 
he cries. And immediately comes the answer, " Be of good courage, behold me." 
"M\ Lord and my God!" Simeon exclaims, as he looks up into that lace, which 
is the "chief among ten thousand and altogether lovely." 

"Hosanna, hosanna to the Son of David!" sing the children. The chief 
priests and Pharisees, who have been standing- aloof, push the common people 
aside, and say angrily to Jesus, "Ilearest thou what these are savin With a 

smile of love for the little ones, taking one little happy child in his arms as he 
speaks, the Saviour answered quietly, "Yea, have ye never read, Out of the mouth 
of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?" And the Pharisees dare 
not answer. 

The whole day was spent in works of mercy. "The blind and the lame came 
to him in the temple, and he healed them." In the evening he went back to 
Bethany, returning on Monday morning to cleanse the temple of the money- 
changers and of those that sold doves. No doubt that day was passed in acts 
of mercy; but we have no record. Tuesday morning he again entered the tem- 
ple courts — for the last time. The chief priests sent to know by what authority 
he had cleansed the temple the day before, but Jesus only answered by asking 
them whether the baptism of John was from heaven or of men. The Pharisees 
would not answer "from heaven;" the)- dared not answer "of men," tor the com- 
mon people fairly worshipped the memory of the Baptist. "Neither," answered 
Jesus, "tell I thee by what authority I do these thing-." But he did not let 
them go without one more warning. The parable of the two sons, one of whom 
said, "I go," and went not, and the other, who, having refused, yet afterward 
obeyed, and the story of the man that let his vineyard out to husbandmen who 
slew hi- servants and even his own son, were both addressed to the priests ami 
Pharisees, and they felt the reproof Jesus meant to give. In their anger they 
tried to arrest him; but the people closed about him, am! they could not touch 
him. But the arrest was only put off — the priests knew well that they would 
conquer in the end, and Jesus knew (what they did not) which of his own dis- 
ciples would betray him into their hand-. 



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